The Warrior Generation This World Needs

The book “Killing Lions” is a conversation between John and Sam Eldredge about the trials young men face.

[John] I believe you young men are the warrior generation this world needs. I believe you will see very trying times, perhaps even the end of the age. The timing of Halo, the film adaptations of The Lord of the Rings, the resurgence of superheroes in film, and all the games and movies like these is curious indeed. Their epic, urgent, heroic battle cry was spoken at this moment in history—your moment. Perhaps it was orchestrated by an unseen hand. You have the strength and the courage to handle what is before you. You do. But you must not try to play Switzerland in this savage war; there is no neutral ground. The only safe move is to boldly take sides with the kingdom of God, take your position in the line. Make the decision to be fully in—to become the warrior, live in the larger story—and everything else will fall into place. “All things shall be added unto you.” Really.

As I think back on my years as a young man, the words I longed to hear were the very words I still eagerly listen for today:
You’re going to be okay.
You’re going to find your way.
You are not alone.

[Sam] That’s really, really good. It’s exactly what I need to hear. Maybe I’ll tape those words to my bathroom mirror, because they are true, they are our birthright as sons of the Living One. “I’m going to be okay. I’m going to find my way. I am not alone.’’

Source: Ransomed Heart Ministries by John Eldredge

Integrity

The man of integrity walks securely, but he who takes crooked paths will be found out.
Proverbs 10:9 (NIV)

Have integrity in all you do.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

When Your Child is Afraid

I was just a reed of a thing when I was a kid, all sinew and strength, lean muscle, no fat. I moved and climbed and ran all the time. At a backyard party when I was five, I climbed a tree fort about six feet up, and promptly jumped off. I wanted to feel what it was like to fly. I still remember the cruel ground rushing up to meet me, and the angry expulsion of every bit of air from my lungs as the soles of my feet crashed into it. I remember the backyard growing immediately silent, all eyes on me. I was embarrassed and proud at the same time.

I always wore a belt back then, cinching it up as tight as it would go, like luggage on top of a station wagon. I remember asking my mom to make extra holes in my belts so they could be even tighter. This worried her so much that she took me to the doctor to see if I could cause any permanent damage by wearing my belt so tight. When he assured my mom that I wasn’t going to rupture my spleen, I kept right on wearing that belt as tight as possible.

I wonder what I was trying to keep in? I wonder what I was trying to secure? I wonder what I was afraid would float away if I didn’t? And I wonder if my mom ever stopped worrying?

I stuttered as a kid, unable to put two words together, groping for words that got stuck deep down inside of me. I remember feeling very shy around adults, and having a very short fuse around certain kids. One time, my third grade friend Jimmy decided to steal the basketball I was using to practice foul shots alone at recess. The rage that exploded out of me was volcanic; I tackled him and cried embarrassed tears. The next thing I knew, we were in the principal’s office, and I couldn’t stop crying, while he grinned at me.

I suppose I might have cinched my belt a little tighter after that. I don’t remember telling my parents about it; I didn’t know how. I just remember feeling so very stupid for crying in front of Jimmy.

And now I have a reed of a child of my own; all muscle and strength. He doesn’t stutter, and he doesn’t wear a belt, but he’s cinching things in already. When his own raging storms rain down on us, they seem to come out of nowhere, and he doesn’t know what to do with them. And as a parent, it’s even harder to watch him go through it than I remember it feeling when I went through it.

What do you do when your child is afraid?

We hate to see our children sad, hurt, upset, not make the team, not get first chair, or experience their first betrayal from another friend. When we see them bravely walking in from the bus, having held it together all day, only to fall apart when they’re around you, our hearts can break at the same time that we feel overwhelmed and exhausted by all the drama. Their trauma becomes traumatic to us; we love them so much that we experience their pain uniquely. The membrane that separates us from our kids is very thin. Sometimes, this is good, and sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it causes us to be a champion for them in ways that are helpful and healing; other times we step in to protect far too soon, squashing an opportunity for them to grow and become because of their pain.

I don’t know what to do when my child is afraid. I’m not always sure when I’m supposed to step in and relieve the pain and when I’m supposed to walk alongside them and help them work it out on their own. I’m trying to learn, but it’s so hard.

Last night, after a particularly hard emotional storm, I was helping my reed of a son do his homework. One of the assignments was to list some character traits of family members, and examples of why they picked those traits. He picked me and one of his brothers. For me, he picked loving and helpful. Under loving, the examples he picked were: He tells me he loves me; He hugs me; He listens to me.

So, parents, when you’re not sure what to do, let’s start here: Tell your child you love them. Hug them as much as you can. And listen to them.

In it together.

Source: The Actual Pastor by Steve Wiens

What God Sees When He Sees You

Your sin has been dealt with. Your Father has removed it from you "as far as the east is from the west" (Ps. 103:12). Your sins have been washed away (1 Cor. 6:11). When God looks at you he does not see your sin. He has not one condemning thought toward you (Rom. 8:1). But that's not all. You have a new heart. That's the promise of the new covenant: "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws" (Ezek. 36:26 -27). There's a reason that it's called good news.

Too many Christians today are living back in the old covenant. They've had Jeremiah 17:9 drilled into them and they walk around believing my heart is deceitfully wicked. Not anymore it's not. Read the rest of the book. In Jeremiah 31:33, God announces the cure for all that: "I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people." I will give you a new heart. That's why Paul says in Romans 2:29, "No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit." Sin is not the deepest thing about you. You have a new heart. Did you hear me? Your heart is good.

What God sees when he sees you is the real you, the true you, the man he had in mind when he made you.

Source: Ransomed Heart Ministries by John Eldredge

Kingdom Ferocity

As Jesus steps out from behind those thirty years of almost total obscurity into the task set before him, both men and demons begin to feel his fierce intention:

He went down to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and on the Sabbath began to teach the people. They were amazed at his teaching, because his message had authority. In the synagogue there was a man possessed by a demon, an evil spirit. He cried out at the top of his voice, “Ha! What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” “Be quiet!” Jesus said sternly. “Come out of him!” Then the demon threw the man down before them all and came out without injuring him. All the people were amazed and said to each other, “What is this teaching? With authority and power he gives orders to evil spirits and they come out!” (Luke 4:31–36)

You cannot appreciate the difficulty of this till you’ve tried it yourself. Most of us wouldn’t walk into a dark alley if we could avoid it. Jesus walks right up to people foaming at the mouth in full-blown demonic possession and confronts the ancient spirits directly. Very intentional. Quite fierce.

Source: Ransomed Heart Ministries by John Eldredge

Prayer

On the day I called, You answered me; You made me bold with strength in my soul.
-Psalm 138:3 (NASB)

Call unto the Lord. Receive the boldness and strength in your soul that will come to you with prayer!

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

The Bull in the China Shop

Jesus is a fierce, intentional man to be sure. But his passions are neither reckless nor momentary.

Could a small, unintimidating figure accomplish such a sustained riot? To pull off driving “all of them out of the temple” would require more than a few seconds and repeated blows. This is a sustained assault. If a frail man with a meek voice tried this, he’d be log-jammed by the sheer number and inertia of the traffic. Jesus is a locomotive, a juggernaut. For all practical purposes here, he is the bull in the china shop.

But is this the Jesus of our worship songs? The religious fog sneaks in to obscure Jesus with lines comparing him to, “a rose trampled on the ground.” Helpless, lovely Jesus. Vegetarian, pacifist, tranquil. Oh, wait—that was Gandhi. Not Jesus.

Can you picture Gandhi or Buddha storming into the polling place of a local election, shouting, overturning tables, sending the participants fleeing? Now throw a small carnival into the mix, which they also need to rout. Impossible. Whoever did this would have to be really committed to clear the building. Fierce and intentional.

This is a breathtaking quality—especially when compared to our present age where doubt masquerades as humility, passivity cloaks as rest, and emasculated indecision poses as laid-back enlightenment.

Oh, Jesus could be soft, and he certainly was humble, but his fierce intentionality is riveting to watch.

Source: Ransomed Heart Ministries by John Eldredge

Dealing with the Black Dog

Some people describe it as dark clouds rolling in, foreboding and immense, covering everything. Some describe it as waves that crash over them until they gasp, breathless in all the worst kinds of ways. Some simply describe it as getting knocked down and washed out.

I call it the Black Dog.

Hulking and scary, the Black Dog blocks the sun and growls at us until we retreat into corners, where we huddle, scared and alone.

Those of us that deal with depression don’t know why it comes or when it will strike. One morning, we just wake up and there it is. We know we’re confusing, the way we shut down at the very moment that opening up might help. When the Black Dog comes, we have a hard time knowing what we want, and what we need. We really don’t know. It’s scary and foggy and the gps isn’t working. I’m not talking about major depression, where you cannot get out of bed, that is another category that needs a different perspective. I’m talking about the kind of depression where you keep working and keep living, but anxiety and gloom accompany you everywhere.

The Black Dog isn’t here with me now, perhaps that’s why I can write about it. But I want to write about it for those of you who deal with him, and for those of you who love someone who deals with him. I’ve found the following things to be helpful, inasmuch as anything can be helpful when things are dark.

I can’t just snap out of it, no matter how hard I try. But man, I’ve really tried hard to snap out of it, and it just leaves me feeling exhausted and defective.

Not everyone knows how to help. Talking to certain people about it helps, but it can’t be anyone who needs you to not be depressed. It can’t be anyone who even subtly is trying to get you to be not depressed, or less depressed (“Just think about all the good things in your life, focus on that!”) It can’t be anyone who tries to over-identify with what you’re feeling (Oh, man, I’ve been there – Let me tell you about...). Friends that really help can hold your gaze, while also holding the tension of hearing the chaos of your inner landscape while not needing to fix you.

I need way more sleep than I think I need. It’s hard to get anything else on track when you are not getting enough sleep.

There is some relief in simply saying it out loud. I remember one time asking someone, “Do you think when I keep saying I’m exhausted, I really should be saying, “I’m depressed?” In that moment, it was like an elicit secret slipped out. It gave me permission to try to find what I needed.

Counselors really do help, if they’re the right kind of counselor. But for me, talk therapy is only part of the solution. I talk until I find the thread, then I usually need to take some action that requires some hard work, following it all the way to its source.

The way out is through. My mentor has said this to me for years and years. It means that you need to go all the way down into the darkness and find out what’s there, in order to come out the other side in a different place. He also says, “There’s no easy way to do a hard thing.” It’s not like you don’t know that, but it’s helpful to hear that what you’re going through is hard.

Being gentle with myself is maybe the biggest thing that helps. When the Black Dog is present, I tend to beat myself up because I just can’t seem to get as much done as I used to, or as much as I think we should. Learn to touch your limits, my friend Becky says. When I touch my limits with judgment, it doesn’t help (What’s wrong with me?). When I touch my limits with grace, (I don’t have to have everything together!) it is helpful.

Perhaps the Black Dog comes because very few of us know how to grieve. Have you ever noticed that when a national tragedy happens (a celebrity death, a shooting, a massive natural disaster), it opens up a valve of grief that you didn’t know had so much pressure behind it? Perhaps the Black Dog shows up because the pressure gets to be too much, and some grief needs to come out. I’ve found it helpful to ask myself, “What losses have I not grieved?”

God is close to the brokenhearted, we read in the Scriptures. So when the Black Dog shows up, so does God. I don’t know how that really works, and I’m not saying I feel God all the time (or very often, to be honest) when the Black Dog is there. But it’s true nonetheless.

I have a sign in my office that reads, “Bidden or not, God is present.”

In it together, friends.

Photo Credit

Source: The Actual Pastor by Steve Wiens

It'll be alright. Matthew 6:31-34

Perspective

The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful.
-Matthew 13:22 (NIV)

Lord, please protect us from the deceitfulness of wealth and give us the mind of Christ when worry and anxiety attempt to creep in.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Trust

The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.
-Exodus 14:14 (NIV)
One of the hardest, yet easiest things to do: be still, in confidence that the Lord will fight for you.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Philippians 4:13

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

Truth

I will steady him, and I will make him strong.
-Psalm 89:21 (NLT)

God promises this to His chosen.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Source: duoparadigms

Patience

"So in the present case, I say to you, stay away from these men and let them alone, for if this plan or action is of men, it will be overthrown; but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them; or else you may even be found fighting against God."
Acts 5:38,39 (NASB)

If something is of man, it will be overthrown. If it is of God, it will stand the test of time. Be patient.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Truth

So Jesus said to them, "Children, you do not have any fish, do you?" They answered Him, "No." And He said to them, "Cast the net on the right-hand side of the boat and you will find a catch." So they cast, and then they were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish.
John 21:5,6 (NAS)

Jesus could have caused only enough fish to swim into the net to feed the disciples, but He didn't. He blessed them extravagantly. Let us be reminded that God loves us that extravagantly.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Choices

You will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever.
Psalm 16:11 (NASB)

God will make known our paths; let us choose to follow.


Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Perspective

This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Psalm 118:24 (ESV)

Be thankful for today; rejoice that God has made this day and steward it in such a way that others around you might experience His presence and joy!

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Redemption

As I live!' declares the Lord GOD, 'I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways!
Ezekiel 33:11a (NASB)

God doesn't want to destroy what's wrong, He wants to redeem it.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Posture

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Psalm 51:10 (ESV)

Jesus, in your mercy, please renew our hearts and our minds. Wipe away the worries, transgressions and fears of yesterday and set our minds and hearts toward you and your ways.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Truth

So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.
James 1:21 (NLT)

Accept God's Word. It is truth.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Truth

You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet.
Psalm 8:6 (ESV)

All things are subject to the authority of Jesus. All things.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis

Love

And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.
1 John 4:21 (NIV)

Consider what it truly means to love those closest to you.

Source: The Daily Verse by Kat Davis