To Belong

We all have an innate desire to belong. Whether directed towards a family, community or just one person, the desire for belonging can be a powerful force. This is because we were made for fellowship. God designed us to need one another, but if we seek to satisfy our desire to belong apart from a relationship with God, we will never be satisfied.

To feel the bond of belonging to someone or even to a group of someones is the among the most wonderful experiences of the heart, and yet, this side of heaven that feeling is fleeting at best. We are sinful creatures clinging to other sinful creatures, expecting them to supply us with stability, acceptance, approval, and love.

But no one on earth can supply those things perfectly or completely, and we are left feeling empty again. To try to fill up the empty places in our hearts with human affection is like pouring water into a strainer and expecting it to stay full.

The only way to truly satisfy our hearts is to fill them with the love of God. To the aching of our hearts, God replies "I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." (John 14:2-3)

Jesus came, died, rose, and ascended for one purpose: to make it possible for us to be with Him. He loves us more than anyone else could begin to love us, and He desires fellowship with us. That place He is preparing will be glorious, and it will be a place of fellowship.

When God allowed John to record what that place would be like, He began by announcing, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God" (Revelation 21:3)

The whole point of heaven is that we will be with the God to whom we belong. Our hearts ache here on earth because this is not our final destination. We are strangers and pilgrims in this world. (I Peter 2:11)

"For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, and house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven" (2 Corinthians 5:1-2)

Our hearts ache to belong, not just to our earthly homes and families, but to our final, perfect, heavenly home, where we will be forever with the Heavenly Father to whom we most wonderfully belong. That ache in our hearts is meant to draw us into closer fellowship with God now, looking forward to an eternity of "in-person" fellowship with Him.

To be Approved

I'm a pleaser. It's how God has wired me, and that innate desire to please the people around me can be a strength, but it can also be a weakness. Instead of seeking to please God by serving others, my focus can easily shift to seeking to please others to gain their approval or love.

It might not seem that big of a deal to try to please others, after all, isn't that an unselfish thing to do?

Actually, the pursuit of approval is completely self-motivated. It is driven by a feeling of emptiness, a desire for the fulfillment that comes when the other person is pleased with us and demonstrates love or acceptance. It makes us feel good, and we naturally want more love, more approval, more acceptance.

This can be very dangerous, however, and God takes the matter seriously. Remember Ananias and Sapphira? Their story is found in Acts 5:1-11. This couple sold a piece of land, and then lied, pretending to give the whole price, when in fact, they were only giving part. They wanted to look like they were being piously generous, but in reality, they were being stingy.  Still, they had a choice. As Peter points out, the land was theirs, the money was theirs, and the choice of what to do with both was theirs. They were not required to give all, so why did they pretend to?

Because they wanted approval.

They wanted the believers in their community to think well of them. Others had done similarly with their land, and no doubt were thought well of for their generosity and dedication to Christ. Selling the land and being seen to give the whole price to the church certainly would have seemed like a good way to gain approval, but they were not acting from a Spirit-led heart. They were acting in self-interest, and not only did it cost them the opinion of the church, it cost them their very lives. God knew their duplicity and put a stop to it there and then.

When we seek to have our longing for approval filled by others, whether it be our peers, parents, bosses, pastors, teachers, or anyone else, we will be easily led into sin. This is why peer pressure works. People want to be approved, thought well of, and liked, and so they will do and say things they never would have done or said otherwise in order to impress.

The problem is, other people can never fill that empty part of our heart that cries out for acceptance, love, and approval. That emptiness exists so God can fill it. Only God can truly satisfy our need for love and approval, only God can give us the fullness of being accepted.

People change. Their approval or acceptance of us, even their love is dependent on what we do. God's approval and acceptance are based first and foremost on what Christ has already done. It is Christ's sacrifice that makes available to us God's acceptance of us.

Ephesians 1:6 says that through Christ we are "accepted in the beloved". For the saved, acceptance is already accomplished, once and for all. Jesus said, "him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out." (John 6:37) Those who come to Christ will never be rejected by Him. And once we belong to God, nothing can remove us from His hand! (John 10:29)

God's love is also not dependent on our behavior. He has said, "I have loved thee with an everlasting love" (Jeremiah 31:3) and Romans 5:8 reminds us, "But God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." He has proved His unconditional love by sacrificing Himself to pay for our sin. I love the way 2 Corinthians 5:21 puts it:

"For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him."

Now, God's love and acceptance are based on Christ's actions, but that does not mean our actions are not important. We have a responsibility to live out the truth of our acceptance before God, and of His love for us. How do we do that? Jesus said, "If ye love Me, keep My commandments" (John 14:15). We show that we love God by obeying. 1 John 2:3 says "And hereby we do know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments." Obviously, obedience is important, because it shows that we have been accepted, that we know God.

We also live out the truth of God's approval by reading and studying the Bible. Timothy is told, "Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." (2 Timothy 2:15) We show ourselves to be "approved unto God" by studying and knowing God's Word. The more we know of God through His Word, the more confidently we can serve Him.

Jesus also said, "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." (John 13:34-35) We show the truth of God's love for us by loving others with the same kind of love He has lavished on us. 

All these things we do only show what is on the inside. It is possible to make a show of doing the "right things" outwardly without getting our inward focus right, like Ananias and Sapphira. No one can fix our focus for us. It is a matter of getting alone with God, confessing our wrong focus, and accepting the truth of His love, His acceptance, and His approval of us through Christ.



One passage that helped me recently in this area was Deuteronomy 32:4, part of the song of Moses:

"He is the Rock, His work is perfect: for all His ways are judgement: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is He."

That was the key for me. I knew all the truths about God's acceptance and approval, but  I had to trust that whether or not I ever gained approval from a certain set of people, God was perfectly just in what He was allowing. It was not until I took the verse apart and applied the truths about God to my specific situation that I really had victory, though.

He is the Rock: unmovable, unchanging, steady, and secure.

His work is perfect: I can trust His working, both in my heart and the hearts of those around me.

for all His ways are judgement: He will only do what is just and right.

a God of truth: Whatever false impression others may have of me, God knows the truth.

and without iniquity: He is good, and this hurt He has allowed will bring good in my life.

just and right is He: I can trust Him.

Whatever other people may think of us, no matter if they approve or disapprove of us, love or hate us, accept or reject us, nothing changes the fact that God has already unalterably approved us in Christ, accepted us as His own, and loved us, before we even came to Him.

"For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Romans 8:38-39

A Biblical Response to Feeling Overlooked or Marginalized

This week, I revisited some study notes on the book of Esther, and I got to thinking about Mordecai. (If you need a refresher on who Mordecai was, go read the book of Esther)

 The kings of Persia were known for their liberal generosity to those who showed their loyalty. Mordecai did just that by exposing the plot to assassinate the king, but he was inexplicably not rewarded. He was forgotten, and his great service to the king treated as if it were nothing at all.

Mordecai probably couldn’t help but be stunned at this turn of events. Of course, there is no indication that he had acted merely for reward, but in a situation when one has done something worthy of reward and is overlooked, it can be more than a little bit disappointing.

Perhaps you have felt like that before. I know I have. When something we have done or a skill we possess is worthy of recognition, but is overlooked, it hurts. It doesn’t matter whether it was purposeful or accidental, or whether there were extenuating circumstances or not; it still feels like being personally rejected. In Mordecai’s day, the king’s accidental slight would have been like a slap in the face to a faithful servant. So what did Mordecai do?

He kept on faithfully serving.

He stayed humble and just did what he knew was right, whether or not he was rewarded. There are several other Biblical characters that come to mind when I think of people who would seem like they had a right to feel marginalized or overlooked.

Joseph- He was literally thrown away by his brothers, sold into slavery just because they wanted to get rid of him. Then, after faithfully serving and repeatedly displaying great skill in his work, he was lied about, unjustly imprisoned, and then forgotten.

David- The prophet Samuel, the most important man in Israel at the time, came to visit his family and asked specifically to meet the sons, and David was left out with the sheep.

Jonathan- His father was Israel’s first king. As firstborn son, Jonathan was considered the rightful heir to the throne –until his father disobeyed and God chose a new king.

John the Baptist- Was famous, all sorts of people traveled into the wilderness to hear him preach. Then Jesus came and the crowds began to fade away.

Bartimaeus- Was blind and had to beg for his daily bread. Jesus was well known to be able to heal people, but when Bartimaeus tried to get Jesus’ attention, the crowd told him to be quiet.

Jesus- Came to earth to save mankind from our sins. When he presented himself in His hometown, He was met with anger and rejected.  The people even tried to throw Him off a cliff!

So, what did these people do when faced with being looked down upon, despised, marginalized, forgotten, or rejected? They just kept doing right. Joseph, like Mordecai, kept on serving faithfully. David kept carefully tending the sheep. Jonathan threw all his efforts into promoting David’s eventual reign. John the Baptist said “He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:30) Bartimaeus kept calling out for healing, and Jesus quietly, humbly went on to the next city:

“But he passing through the midst of them went his way, And came down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and taught them on the sabbath days.” (Luke 4:30-31)

Each of these, and of course the Lord Jesus most of all, serves as an example of how we should face those times when we are overlooked, when our efforts, abilities, or ideas are dismissed, or when we are blatantly rejected. We should keep on, committing ourselves and our “right” to recognition, acceptance, and approval to God. As I Peter 4:19 says:

“Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to Him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.”

We can trust God. And He is faithful. Mordecai was honored, Joseph was promoted and his abilities recognized, David was made king, Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father and now sits enthroned in glory. --Not all of the situations were turned around. Jonathan and John the Baptist had to wait for heaven to receive their reward, but notice that they were fully content just to serve God and others while they lived. Their eyes were on God's approval, not man's.

God is faithful whether or not we are recognized and accepted by others. No matter how many people reject or overlook us, serving God should be about God. When our focus is right, His approval and recognition not only becomes enough for us; we begin to see that it is all that really matters.

Thirsty for God

It had been a long day, and I was looking forward to sleep. I lay still for a while and just as I got warm and comfortable and began to feel I might drift off any moment... it hit me. 

I was thirsty.

the thirst didn't bother me until I actually recognized the thought. Then it became persistent. Annoyed, I tried to ignore it and go to sleep, but to no avail. My mouth and throat began to get dry and I knew if I fell asleep then, my sleep would be fitful at best, filled with dreams of deserts, climaxing when I finally found water, only to wake up at the crucial moment to the memory of my real-life thirst. 

Maybe this story is familiar to you. It's funny how all-consuming thirst can be. It's our bodies' way of alerting us to the fact that water is indeed necessary for life. 

My problem is, that I don't particularly like drinking water. I would much rather have coffee or tea or something that at least tastes good, but water is what my body needs, and those things I would rather fill my thirst with are often the things that will leave me the most thirsty for more. But the more I discipline myself to drink water, the more I actually begin to desire it. I get thirsty and crave water, because that is what my body is used to receiving. And the more I satisfy that craving with water, the more the water actually begins to taste good to me.

The more water I drink, the easier it is to make healthy choices about what I use to satisfy my thirst. 

Did you know that is the same way it's meant to be with God? Listen to how the Bible relates thirst to our relationship with God:

"As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, O God.

My soul panteth for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God?" (Psalm 42:1-2

"O God, Thou art my God; early will I seek Thee: my soul thirsteth for Thee, my flesh longeth for Thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is" (Psalm 63:1)

"I stretch forth my hands unto Thee: my soul thirsteth after Thee, as a thirsty land. Selah" (Psalm 143:6)

And Jesus Himself says:

"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled" (Matthew 5:6)

Not only is this thirst for righteousness to be filled, its life-giving flow is to abound. As Jesus told the woman at the well:

"But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." (John 4:14)

And later He proclaims in the midst of a crowd, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth in Me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." (John 7:38)

We are not just containers to be filled with the fullness of God (Eph.3:19), we are to be rivers, pouring abundantly into the lives of others around us. As we satisfy our thirst for God, we will not only turn to Him more readily to satisfy our thirst, but our satisfaction will be so abundant that it will affect everyone around us. And that is what makes the world look at us and see the fullness of God. It is what brings to their hearts the question of how we can be so fulfilled while their lives feel so empty. 

...and a Happy New Year!

It is the very first moments of a brand new year, and I wanted to share this passage from Ephesians 3 with you, for this, dear reader, is my prayer for you in this bright and shining start of a new decade:

"That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man;
That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
May be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God"
Ephesians 3:16-19

That is the purpose of this blog: to point your eyes to the fullness of God which really can be yours as you seek Him and learn of Him.

Aren't you glad that God's goodness is not dependent upon our age, status, or stage of life? Wherever you're at, God is the same. He is not the author of emptiness, but of fullness; not of darkness, but of light; not of despair, but of hope. However turbulent the year may prove to be, God remains, and with Him the love and fullness which are always ours in Christ.

"Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, 
Unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen."
Ephesians 3:20-21

Waiting on God in the "Silent Years"

This morning at church, Pastor made an interesting observation: after Joseph’s lifetime, there was nothing recorded in Israel’s history for about 400 years. He posed the question, “Was God at work during those silent years?” His answer and mine is a resounding “Yes!”, but the fact remains that, historically speaking, while God was at work, He did not see fit to record any of His working during that period, making it easy to see that period as unimportant or insignificant.

Yet, if you know the Lord as I do, you know that He is ever present with His children. Even during those silent times, He would have been at work in millions of ways every day that encouraged the faithful among the Israelites. They may have been living in a “silent” period, waiting, watching, longing for the deliverance God had promised at the end of the 400 years, but God saw, God heard, and God loved them. He was present with them and purposeful in what He allowed, using even the difficulty of the years in slavery to prepare His people for the blessings to come. After all, if Egypt had been a place of freedom and prosperity, they would not have wanted to follow Moses across the wilderness --even for a land flowing with milk and honey.

 God often allows seasons of difficulties to make us willing to accept the blessings He has prepared for us later on. 

And those difficulties are sometimes “silent years” in our lives. They may span days, weeks, months, or years. They are periods of seemingly unimportant slogging along, not sure if we are accomplishing anything meaningful. Those are the times when one can doubt that God is at work. You may feel forgotten or left out as friends move freely down the pathways God has for them, as you stay still, seemingly stuck in a muddy patch on yours. But even in the muddy spots, God is there. Look for Him in the silence. Seek Him in the struggle. 

Let me tell you a story to illustrate. Once there was a young teen-aged girl who just might have been me. She lived out her Junior High years in an imaginary world of her own making, always imagining a different life, with different circumstances and different people.

 In High School, she began to grow up and somehow knew God wanted her to begin living in reality instead of trying to escape the ordinary, every-day life He had given her. As she looked around her, though, she realized that she was lonely. She had family who loved her, and she had friends she saw once in a while, but there was still something missing. 

She began to seek the Lord, beginning again to read through her Bible and, for the first time, praying regularly. She would get up very early and sit by the window of her upstairs bedroom like a princess in a tower, but instead of imagining a prince charming emerging from amongst the apple trees, she now began to revel in the beauty of her moment-by moment reality: the way the light painted the leaves, how lovely the gentle breeze was that blew in from the open window, the joyful sound of robins singing as if to celebrate the new day, the truths she was learning as she sat there reading God’s Word. 

After a while, she began to realize that God was showing His love to her every day in small, sweet, thoughtful ways. Sometimes it was sending a bird to sing to her on a particularly dreary day, another time it was a yard full of her favorite flowers which she had never noticed before, even though she walked past it nearly every day. Another time a whole string of traffic stopped to let her across the street when she wasn’t feeling well but had to walk to piano lessons anyway.

Bit by bit, she began to see God at work and the more she saw His love, the more she looked for Him. And the more she looked for Him, the more she found Him, right there, showing His love for her again and again. And soon her loneliness began to lessen, and she began to find that God is enough, even for the routine of daily life during a seemingly insignificant and unimportant season of life.

I won’t say that the girl was never lonely again, or that she always had that sense of closeness to the Lord every minute of the rest of her life, but I will say that whether or not she saw it at the time, God has always been right there with her, showing His love just the same whether or not she thought to look for it. 

“Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you” James 4:8a

Finding God to be Enough in Times of Grief

Grief is difficult to describe. I have heard it likened to drowning, and the adjective “overwhelming” has been among the most common I have heard used to describe the emotional turmoil of loss. But how can one adequately describe such a powerful feeling? 

I attended a memorial service for a beloved uncle last week, and I must admit, I couldn’t think of a better way of describing grief than the definition the pastor used: that grief is a hole in one’s heart that is carried with us for the rest of our lives. 

I cried at my uncle’s service, as I have cried over the loss of other relatives: not because of any sadness for them, (they are enjoying the glories of heaven!) but because a part of my heart is empty. 

I have found that grief is not the all-consuming pit of despair I had expected it to be when viewing it through the eyes of childhood. It is more like a flash flood. It comes powerfully, in waves. 

When my Gramma died (my first “real” experience with grief), I cried a great deal in the first few days, but even during that first intense period of grief, the waves would come and go. It was not a steady stream of sorrow; and even now there are times when I see a picture of her, or hear someone say something she often said, or smell the scent of the hairspray she used, and all at once I feel that emptiness acutely and the flood of grief washes over me anew. 

For me, these floods are usually caused by or at least strengthened or prolonged by “nevermore” thoughts. For example, the day my uncle was put on hospice, Mommy asked me to bake a small apple pie for my uncle. I was happy to do so, but as I prepared to bake, I found myself overwhelmed with grief as the same idea raced again and again through my mind:

His last pie. 

 The last pie I will ever make him.

The last pie he will ever get to eat.

As it turned out, he actually never got to eat the pie I made; he went to heaven the next morning before the pie could be delivered.  But I think God intended the making of the pie to benefit me more than my uncle anyway. It made me come to terms with the reality of the coming loss before it was upon me.

When my Gramma died, the “nevermore” thought that was on auto repeat through my head as I drove home from the hospital (and many times after that) was that she never got to see me in a wedding dress. Oh, how she would have loved to! She delighted to see her grandkids all dressed up, and I used to stop by to see her whenever there was an occasion to dress up for. Several times in the first year after she went to heaven, I had the thought as I got ready for some special occasion, “I should stop by to see Gramma afterwards” and was struck with the thought that I never could do that again.

But despite these oh-so-poignant “nevermores”, I have found that God is enough, even in grief. In every area of loss, whether it be loss of our dearest people or dreams or health or plans of how our lives “should” be, God’s character never changes, and Romans 8:28 still applies.

In my few sorrows, I have learned that dealing with grief and loss is just like dealing with any other area of aching emptiness: the answer is surrender.

Now, before you tune me out for being unfeeling, know that I do acknowledge that grief is real, raw, and powerful. To say that the answer is surrender in no way diminishes the reality of grief. But God is as His Word says, “a very present help in trouble”. In fact, Psalm 46, the first verse of which contains that wonderful truth of God’s presence and support in trouble, goes on to describe earthquakes and mountains melting into the ocean and angry waves shaking even the mountains. Yet, the very next thought is “There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High.” (v.4) There is comfort to be found, yes and even gladness in the midst of such turmoil. The way to such peace and joy is found in verse 10: “Be still, and know that I am God”

The problem with my “nevermore” thoughts is that they presume to pass judgement on how things “should have been”, instead of accepting how God has allowed them to be.

It has well been said that “Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.’”[i] But God is the Master of our reality. In times of grief, when the billows of sorrow and floods of “nevermores” overwhelm us, the choice to trust in God’s character and wisdom is crucial.

Think of Job. He suffered loss most of us will never come near to experiencing, but even in those first moments of grief and agony, he responded in a way God describes as being without sin.

Here is Job’s response: 

“Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21)

These words have been quoted and held up as an example to suffering people ever since Job’s story was first told, but I want you to notice God’s view of them. The very next verse clearly states why it was that Job’s response was right:

“In all this, Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly.” (Job 1:22)

Here’s where it hits me the hardest: Those “nevermores” I so readily wallow in are nothing more than thinly veiled complaints about what God has allowed. In other words, I am foolishly charging God with incompetence or negligence at best, and malice at worse. After all it is God’s “good and perfect” will we are arguing with. (Romans 12:2)

Godly grief acknowledges sorrow and the feelings of loss, but chooses gratitude over complaint, humble trust over bitterness, and hope over despair.

God has designed us to feel those empty places. But the reason He wants us to notice them is so that He can fill them. When my heart feels hollow, I must choose to cry out to God, for Scripture promises: “draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you.” (James 4:8) When I yield my sorrow and hurt to Him, I never cease to find that He is enough.

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[i] John Greenleaf Whittier, “Maud Muller”