Spiritual Coffee: When One Spouse Leaves the Church - Keeping a Tender Heart Toward the Hard-Hearted - Understanding Little Sisters of the Poor

Today’s three links to the best things I've come across in the past few days to feed a Christian mind and heart. Click on Spiritual Coffee for prior roundups to sharpen and equip your Christian thinking.

Blessed Are the Agnostics, Stina Kielsmeier-Cook (her•meneutics, Christianity Today)

Her husband gave up on the church; she stayed. Too often we act like we don’t see people struggling through things like this because we don’t know what to say or do. Listen to how she wrestled with her doubts, her husband’s soul, divided worldviews in parenting, and what she needs from the church. Candid and earnest. These are people we need to listen to and learn to welcome.

Not Hardening Our Hearts Against the Hard-Hearted, David Schrock (davidschrock.com)

Insightful and helpful reflections for understanding the blindness and self-deception in friends and church members who are caught up in sin. How to seek their hearts while guarding your own against becoming jaded or discouraged.

n.b. The quote from 2 Timothy 2:22-25 seems to be missing from the end, right before the prayer in italics. But it’s a perfect complement to the post, so read it alongside.

"When they harden themselves against us, we must pray. In love, our response must not be passivity but wise, repeated strategic appeals to that member of Christ’s body. Matthew 18 is not a quick pitstop that enables churches to get rid of unwanted sinners; it is a long, arduous pathway to restore those who have been and are being deceived by sin."

"Sin is irrational and causes the sinner to make statements and take actions that are mystifying. These words and actions are not “out of character,” as many like to put it. They are tragically “in character,” as indwelling sin comes to the surface. Hebrews 3 reminds us, every believer has blindspots and chambers in their heart which, when released, exude poison.""Often these well-versed believers will make these steps quoting Scripture on their way. We are a twisted bunch and none of us are immune from deception."

"Left unchecked, sin will always go further than we first intended."

"Sin is not innocent or accidental, it is the self-willed desire to go our own way and to persist on the road to destruction. Immediately, hardness of heart—anger in speech, isolation in action, unwillingness to listen, self-justification, and personal advocacy—occur. And more than occur, they increase. Like yeast, sin leavens the whole heart. And thus it needs to be opposed—both internally by the Spirit-filled individual but also externally by the church, when that individual is a beloved member of the church."

Little Sisters of the Poor – Thoughts on the Decision in the Contraception Mandate Case, Mark Movsesian (First Things)

Christians should understand the United States Supreme Court's decision in Zubik v. Burwell, the case involving Little Sisters of the Poor and the HHS Mandate that would have forced them to pay for contraceptives against their religious beliefs. This is a good summary. Some overall high points (from several sources):

• The Little Sisters asked to be exempt from being required to pay for health care plans that would include providing contraceptives to people, because their religious beliefs prohibit using contraception (additionally, many forms of contraception can act as abortifacients that can trigger rejection of a live embryo by the body after conception).
• The Department of Health and Human Services ("HHS") mandated under the Affordable Care Act (commonly called Obamacare) that the Sisters must pay for the plans and ensure free contraception. No religious exemption was granted.
• The decision did not settle what kind of accommodation the Little Sisters should receive, but it is nevertheless basically a win for two reasons: 1) the Supreme Court did not say the Sisters can't have an exemption for religious beliefs, but actually sent the case back to the district court with instructions to have the Obama Administration find an accommodation that would fit the Sisters beliefs - which means the Court believes one is possible and that one should be made; and 2) the Sisters had been charged with very heavy fines in district court because they were not cooperating with the HHS Mandate to provide health insurance with free contraception, and the Supreme Court vacated all those decisions, effectively wiping out all the fines and penalties.
• The decision was unanimous. There was no disagreement indicated among the eight justices.
• Remarkably, President Obama came out the day after the decision with a statement applauding the decision as a victory for religious freedom, and the President said that there is no need for the Sisters and other religious groups to be required to pay for plans with free contraception, because employees can get free contraception in other ways.
• As Movsesian notes, it is odd that the President should take that position after his HHS has insisted for five years of litigation that employees have no other options for affordable contraception and that making the Sisters pay for it is necessary. It almost looks as if the administration's objective all along was not ensuring free contraception (which they now admit is already available in other ways) but overpowering religious objections to being forced to participate - a test of whether the government can get away with compelling religious groups to act against their beliefs if it wants to. Thankfully, the answer again is no.

Lecrae Calls It Like It Is - Christians Need to Ride the Storm

I value Christian rapper Lecrae for many things, but most of all for his sincerity and realism. He just speaks plainly about failures, weaknesses, struggles, and the real suffering and pressure of life. He doesn't project the image that because he's a "celebrity" as a Christian and a rapper, he's got it all together. And he doesn't try to present the image that Christians have it all under control either.

When you're successful as a Christian in the public eye, there is a huge temptation to want to portray Christianity as being the ideal life where everything works out. It's tempting to try to use your own success as a proof of Christianity's truth. The problem is, it isn't a real image. Christianity doesn't solve all your problems in this life; it solves them all for eternity. Christians suffer almost all the same troubles as everyone else on earth; but only Jesus Christ can back up a promise that those troubles end up serving you by building you up for eternal joy. Everyone gets tossed by the waves, but in Christ the waves carry your vessel home instead of setting it adrift. What matters is not whether you suffer a little more or a little less, but that the suffering itself isn't meaningless. If I can profit by my suffering, then it's not a cause for despair.

This meditation from Lecrae captures it beautifully:
Note: If this link didn't work for you last night, it's fixed now. His Facebook homepage is linked at the end just in case.

Lecrae

Soap box moment...

 I know people are encouraged by quick social media quotes but as I've gotten older trials have been more complicated. More friends divorce, die, lose family members. Systemic oppression around the world, division amongst cultures, ethnicities, religions, and social classes, depression, anxiety, addiction.

I used to wander aimlessly looking for existential solutions for my inner pains. Sex, substances, entertainment, and other distractions made me a type of floating raft in the ocean of life. Tossed by every wind and wave.

The next season was embracing my faith and most of my faith journey was a speed boat. Gathering, doing, serving, racing, learning, and sharing, but I found that's the quickest way to run outta gas.

There's just not always an answer to life's woes in a nice neat Facebook quote. It doesn't make you less spiritual it just makes you real.

I'm learning now to be a sailboat. It's not always go go go. It's calculated, it's strategic for sure, but the work goes into putting up the sail and learning how to steer as the waves of life start rocking.

I can't control the waves of hardship. But it doesn't mean I just carelessly float and let them carry me wherever. I can't motorboat thru my pains either. There's not always a quick solution, quote or sermon to get me thru the ugliness of life.

But I can cast my sail up and trust God as my navigator. I can trust that He's ultimately in control of the wind and waves and that if I continue adjusting my rudder and sail, eventually I'll make it to the island of paradise.

The storms WILL come, the waves will toss and turn but keep holding on. Learn how to sail, and trust the Divine navigator...it may be a long journey.

(Lecrae on Facebook)

Get Used to Failure if You Want to Overcome It

Failure is something we all dread. The fear of failure often produces tremendous anxiety. The experience of failure often produces depression and shame and bitterness. Notice those are all emotions that Christians are told to resist and overcome. We are not meant to sit alone after a loss, feeling sorry for ourselves and wondering if we have what it takes. We are meant to put our trust in God and keep going. (See 2 Corinthians 1:8-10.) Easier said than done, of course. But here is one of the most encouraging lessons I've seen on why you should simply make peace with failure and keep pressing on through it.

Naval Admiral William H. McRaven, a Navy SEAL for 36 years and ninth commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, gave an extraordinary commencement address in 2014 to the University of Texas at Austin. You may have seen it shared widely on Facebook and in many blogs and business and professional magazines. The YouTube video embedded below has had over 3.4 million views, and rightly so. The speech is remarkable because Adm. McRaven drew on ten lessons from Navy SEAL training that apply to pretty much everything in life and work for anyone. They're all good, but there is one that made a huge impression on me. It's the lesson of the "sugar cookie."

Several times a week, the instructors would line up the class and do a uniform inspection. It was exceptionally thorough. Your hat had to be perfectly starched, your uniform immaculately pressed and your belt buckle shiny and void of any smudges. But it seemed that no matter how much effort you put into starching your hat, or pressing your uniform or polishing your belt buckle — it just wasn't good enough. The instructors would find "something" wrong.

For failing the uniform inspection, the student had to run, fully clothed into the surfzone and then, wet from head to toe, roll around on the beach until every part of your body was covered with sand. The effect was known as a "sugar cookie." You stayed in that uniform the rest of the day — cold, wet and sandy.

There were many a student who just couldn't accept the fact that all their effort was in vain. That no matter how hard they tried to get the uniform right, it was unappreciated. Those students didn't make it through training. Those students didn't understand the purpose of the drill. You were never going to succeed. You were never going to have a perfect uniform.

Sometimes no matter how well you prepare or how well you perform you still end up as a sugar cookie. It's just the way life is sometimes.

If you want to change the world get over being a sugar cookie and keep moving forward. 

Mark this: the people who gave up and went home - the ones who didn't become Navy SEALs - were the ones who couldn't accept failure. The ones who succeeded and became SEALs were the ones who learned to get used to failure and keep going. The point of the exercise was to ensure that everyone ended up a "sugar cookie." No illusions here that some people always get it right while others fall short. The only way forward was to accept that you were going to fail, and to keep trying anyway. What sent some of the men home was simply pride. Our fear of failure, and our avoidance of situations where we might fail, does not come from an urgent need to accomplish important things. The people who accomplish important things are the ones who keep trying and failing until they get it right. Our fear and avoidance is due to our vanity in wanting to look successful and impressive. The ones who went home were the ones who couldn't handle the idea of having to look like a failure in order to get to the point of success. 

Bonus points if you're thinking: Kobayashi Maru. This was the infamous test at Starfleet Academy in Star Trek that every person training for command must take. And it was deliberately impossible. This quote by Spock in the 2009 Star Trek film captures it perfectly: "The purpose is to experience fear. Fear in the face of certain death. To accept that fear and maintain control of oneself and one’s crew.” The purpose of this training exercise was never to succeed. The purpose was to learn to maintain courage and control even when everything failed; to avoid giving in to panic or despair. The lesson is to never let your perception that you are failing or your fear of losing tempt you into giving up. The people that succeed are the ones that refuse to give up after failing (or after thinking they've failed).

The application for Christians is critical: more often than anything, it's our doubts about how we're doing and our own insecurities that discourage us and cause us to get derailed. Very often we are on the right track spiritually but we lose heart because we can't see that things are working out. Our perception is that we've failed, and we shrink back from what seems hopeless. 

Keeping our faith fixed in God includes persevering in doing the right thing even when the evidence of our senses tells us we're losing. We trust in God's point of view instead: "When I thought, 'My foot slips,' your steadfast love, O LORD, held me up. When the cares of my heart are many, your consolations cheer my soul." (Psalm 94:18-19). One of the precious comforts in Scripture is that God often does His most glorious work when it looks like it's already too late. Think about how the disciples felt for those three days after Jesus died upon the cross. And then...

We need to stop keeping score of our "successes" and worrying if we think our "failures" outnumber them. We need to stop measuring ourselves against other people or against what we think a successful Christian should look like. Everybody ends up a sugar cookie sooner or later. Instead, we need to keep following Christ in every way we can, and trust Him to make the most of the results.

"Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised." (Hebrews 10:35-36)

Be Confident About God's Love for You - He Commands It

Distrusting your own motives and your desires is a prudent habit. We have good reasons to be suspicious of our own judgment about what is right and wrong: the clearest evidence of this is how often we do get it wrong, only to come to our senses later and regret our foolishness. But when self-examination and distrust of our hearts crosses over into doubt about whether we are accepted and favored by God, we are going straight against God's counsel to us. Doubting ourselves is one thing; but we are not meant to doubt the faithfulness and constancy of God's love. One of my greatest comforts is that God actually commands us not to doubt His love. It's not just something I want to be sure about; the Lord insists that I be sure about it.

"And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises." (Hebrews 6:11-12 ESV)

"I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life." (1 John 5:13 ESV)

"Assurance" is another way of saying confidence in God. There are two dimensions or parts to assurance: having confidence that God truly is who He says He is and will do all He has promised; and having confidence that you are indeed forgiven by God for all your sins and accepted as His child (being "saved").¹  The second part of assurance is believing that you have personally received salvation and forgiveness and that you are now accepted by God. If you don't have the first part secure, trusting God to be who the Scriptures say He is and trusting that He will do what He has promised, the second part doesn't give you much confidence. Being sure you are God's child is an uncertain comfort if you don't believe God is dependable. But if you get the first part straight and still doubt that God specifically loves and accepts you, then you will be doubtful and insecure about whether you personally will benefit from His dependability and faithfulness. So it is crucial to work on being confident that God loves you personally and fully intends to fulfill all His promises in your life.

Spurgeon nails the most important part of this: "[W]e shall never find comfort or assurance by looking within. But the Holy Spirit turns our eyes entirely away from self ... We shall never find happiness by looking at our prayers, our doings, or our feelings; it is what Jesus is, not what we are, that gives rest to the soul. If we would at once overcome Satan and have peace with God, it must be by ‘fixing our eyes on Jesus.’" (Morning and Evening, p. 360). Assurance is found in seeking to know God in the fullest way possible, largely through examining the Scriptures, which display the best and most complete picture of Him we can have, and through seeking Him directly in prayer. And here it is also vital to remember that Jesus Christ is the way God has revealed Himself to us, and it is through Jesus that we come to know God. "He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power." (Heb. 1:3). "No one has ever seen God; the only God [Jesus], who is at the Father's side, he has made him known. (John 1:18). If you would know God, fix your eyes on Jesus.

The more you know God, the more you see He is trustworthy. And the more you know God, the more you discover whether what you see is lovely and appealing and precious. One of the best confirmations that you are accepted and loved by God is that you love what you see of Him. And because our Lord loves us, He does not want us to neglect that source of joy and comfort.

The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” (Luke 10:17-20)

1 For those interested, here is the definition from Louis Berkhof's Systematic Theology: "There is a twofold assurance, namely, (1) The objective assurance of faith, which is 'the certain and undoubting conviction that Christ is all He professes to be, and will do all He promises.' … (2) The subjective assurance of faith, or the assurance of grace and salvation, which consists in a sense of security and safety, rising in many instances to the height of an 'assured conviction that the individual believer has had his sins pardoned and his soul saved.'" (pp. 562-63).

No Reason to Despair, and Nothing to Fear - Thoughts on Today's Marriage Ruling at Supreme Court

Today's United States Supreme Court ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges (PDF copy at the link) means same-sex marriage unions must now be recognized and allowed by all 50 states. This post is for my friends who are discouraged by today's decision. I know there are Christian brothers and sisters who don't disagree with this ruling and who feel strongly about it. For them, today is probably not a day of mourning, but right now I want to spend time with those who mourn. I think we have many, many reasons to be encouraged, so take heart.

Mourning for the Right Reasons

First, we should mourn. Mourning is the proper emotion to feel when we see people celebrating things that are harmful to themselves. When we see people embracing what the church has always warned us against, we should mourn for the state of society and for the sake of their souls. This was exactly Paul's response: "It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans, for a man has his father's wife. And you are arrogant! Ought you not rather to mourn?" (1 Corinthians 5:1-2).

What we should not do is surrender to self-pity. There is a crucial difference between mourning for the people who are chasing after emptiness by embracing same-sex marriage and simply feeling sorry for ourselves. This is not a time to despair or to surrender to the wave of depressing emotions that come along with any event that makes us feel overwhelmed and powerless. Tolkien put it beautifully in the mouth of Gandalf: "despair is only for those who see the end beyond all doubt." (The Lord of the Rings). We must not despair just because things turn out to be much harder than we hoped. Our confidence is not in courts or governments or cultures or civilizations. The society we have citizenship in is the kingdom of heaven, and the growth of that kingdom is not measured by things like this court decision. Focus on the souls of people, not on the shifting sands of culture.

Second, we should reject all anger and bitterness and resentment. Those are emotions born from self-pity or self-righteousness. Either they come from feeling wounded pride at being rejected and being left out, or they come from being indignant and self-righteous about the sins of others. Christian, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. There are a number of people in conservative political circles who will be venting about this decision and stirring up anger. Resolve not to listen to them. Turn off the television and the radio. Do not read what they post online. Guard your heart and mind against anyone who is spreading these emotions in the air. Give it a week before you even consider tuning in again (if you do at all). These things do not build us up in Christ.

As I was composing this earlier, I had the chance to read Russell Moore's commentary in The Washington Post. Read it. He is wise, peaceful, courageous, and practical, rather than angry.

Don't Let Love Lose

There will be many people celebrating same-sex marriages and this ruling with the phrase "Love Wins!" I fear that the reflex of many Christians will be to distance themselves so much from those who welcomed this decision that they will actually let their love grow cold. This is not a time to be uncertain about how to approach or communicate with those who embrace same-sex marriage or homosexual relationships. You do not need to agree with them to love them! Love is not dependent on agreement. This is the time to make sure that we put the love of Christ on display as purely and powerfully as ever.

Many people who have advocated for same-sex marriage will be expecting us to be bitter and hostile. They will be expecting us to entrench ourselves against them or fight back. They have been told for a long time that the opposition of Christians to same-sex marriage is based on hate and prejudice. Prove them wrong. Spend as much time getting to know them and showing them the love of Christ as you can. Don't shrink back from this because you don't know how to talk to them about this. There are many very wise and helpful resources that have been written on how to show love to someone you disagree with, including those you disagree with about homosexual behavior. Start here with The Gospel Coalition website and keep on searching there and on Desiring God and Russell Moore's blog. Get prepared to interact with people in love.

Above all, don't let the state of the civil law be a stumbling block to loving people. We are not responsible for policing people's behavior. That has never been the mission of the Church. Paul actually told us we have nothing to do with judging the moral behavior of unbelievers. (1 Cor. 5:9-13).We are supposed to preach the Gospel to all. That means you are off the hook for feeling like you have to prevent any same-sex wedding or marriage. Yes, we want to warn people against these things, and part of preaching the Gospel includes helping people become conscious of sin and how they have fallen short of the glory of God. But that is different than trying to hold them to a standard of behavior and enforce it on them. Granted, Paul makes a distinction between how we treat moral commands with those inside the Church compared with how we deal with unbelievers. But for now, consider that it is not your burden to stop people who don't believe the Scriptures from embracing same-sex marriage. It is only your responsibility to preach the love of Christ to them. Focus on that.

If you had a friend who was getting divorced for sinful reasons, you would certainly do everything you could to plead with her and reason with her not to go through with it. But even if you could sue to stop the divorce (which you can't), I doubt you would. That would change your relationship from being a friend to being an opponent. It would cross a line. The same with a friend getting re-married after an unbiblical divorce. You might not attend the marriage. But I doubt you would try to legally block it even if you could. Consider what that means for how you interact with friends embracing same-sex marriage. Your role as a Christian and friend is to show the Gospel and demonstrate love. And do it with perseverance and prayer and earnestness. But you don't have to change the law or panic if they go through with the ceremony. Loving people who are deceived by sin often does not result in their turning away from sin immediately. We have to be patient and persevere in love, showing our commitment to their good. The results are up to God. Be encouraged that His Spirit is at work, and that is what ultimately changes people's hearts. The state of the law can only hold things back for a time. The heart is where people get saved.

Why Is God So Hard to Find? (Part 2)

Continuing what I started in the last post, here are two more possible reasons God may seem distant or absent when He really is trying to help us:

3. It may be that we've started taking God for granted. Perhaps we've stopped putting the highest priority on seeking Him. We aren't rebelling against Him or living a double life, but we've just begun to be a bit casual about our spiritual life. We don't really feel like we need to read the Bible as often, or we let other things get in the way of church or fellowship much more than we used to. What can God do but remind us how much we need Him? If we've started to take the ability to draw water from the well for granted, then not being able to get it when we want it will restore our appreciation for how important it is in a hurry. If you have to dig down deep and toil to get the water flowing again, you will not soon take it for granted.

As a severe example of this, I have been struck by how often this theme was demonstrated in the Old Testament. God warned Israel over and over that when things started going well for them and they were prospering, they would begin to forget Him. And that's just what happened. As long as Israel was comfortable, they would often grow careless in their relationship with God. But if they were in danger and suffering, they quickly remembered Him and called upon Him. The same is true for us. We have to remember that we always need to be in close intimacy with God, just as the branches depend completely upon the vine for life. (John 15:1-9.)

4. One more possible explanation is that we just haven't taken sin seriously enough or fully appreciated God's call to holiness. We may have turned our backs on some serious sins because of our faith, and we may be actively resisting temptation, but perhaps there are areas in our hearts that we haven't confronted completely. For example, we may have worked hard against greed or lust, but failed to address the underlying problem of self-pity. As we seek God and struggle to find that deep communion with Him again, He may reveal to us areas where we aren't taking His call to holiness as seriously as we should. Holiness is a lifelong pursuit, but the fact that we will not complete it until we leave this life behind should not discourage us from pursuing it diligently.

The Scripture reminds us that we need to take this seriously every day: "But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called 'today,' that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin." (Hebrews 3:13.) Paul says: "Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God." (2 Corinthians 7:1.) And although we find it difficult now, a deep struggle for our relationship with God is often necessary to cause us to take the life of faith seriously: "Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God." (1 Peter 4:1-2.) At the end, that's what we want: to live for and be satisfied with God. And God will graciously spur us on in order to get us there.

Why Is God So Hard to Find? (Part 1)

In the last post I explained why we need to keep on seeking God and not give up, even when we feel we're coming up empty. This post and the next one are meant to consider some of the reasons why God can seem so distant or absent. I compared this feeling in the last post with a well that is no longer giving water. But why would God stop refreshing us when we come to Him in need?

It would be one thing if you were stubbornly sinning, and trying to have a deep relationship with God without confessing that sin and turning away from it. That's an obvious problem. But I am assuming here that you've already searched your heart and there isn't any stubborn refusal to confess sin. You simply can't find a reason for why God suddenly seems distant or absent. You know you're not perfect, but you've been seeking Him and trying sincerely to follow Him. So what happened?

Here's some of what my experience and the Scriptures have taught me:

1. Perhaps, without knowing it, you've only been skimming the shallowness of the water, and there are deep wells below that which will refresh you beyond anything you've ever experienced. God may be saying: "I love you completely, and I will never give up on you. But this living at 75% of your fullness must stop. Dig deep and experience me fully so that you will live your life with freedom and boldness!" God knows you won't dig down and find the deep satisfaction waiting for you unless He leaves you no choice. As long as the shallow water is enough to get by on, we're likely to just skim it off and try to make it through the day. One way I've realized this in my life is in reading the Bible much more deeply and intensely than ever before. Where I might have read a passage four or five times, and thought I grasped it well enough, deep concentration and prayer have often revealed truth and wisdom in the words that I never saw before.

If reading the Bible or praying aren't fulfilling your need for God's spirit like they used to, and you double your efforts to press in and experience God, you often find self-awareness or knowledge of God you never had before. Some of the Scriptures that have impressed themselves on me during times like this have become the most precious words in the Bible to me. They encourage me more than just about anything else, and they often encourage me when nothing else will. Imagine if God stopped up your well and left you parched with thirst, so you would dig feverishly down and down, because He knew there was a magnificent ruby buried down there. When you find something as precious and valuable as those Scriptures have become to me, all the dryness and pain seem well worth it. Suddenly you find that God has so much more to give you to sustain you and bring you joy than you ever realized.

2. Another possibility is that God is preparing you for something much more important and more significant than you've ever experienced before. Instead of your relationship with God being off track, it may be that what you've been doing in your relationship with God has been precisely right, and thus you've matured and grown in your faith. Now you're prepared to handle something greater than you ever imagined. God doesn't call us to lounge about in His courts. He calls us to take up the battle against darkness and bring light to those still enslaved to sin. In order to meet the challenge, He knows you need to have access to a much greater store of faith and confidence than you ever had before. As Hebrews 12:7-11 describes, God is treating you as an heir and training you to stand firm in righteousness.

If You're Dry, Don't Give Up Digging

What do you do when your spiritual life is dry and parched? When you go to the Bible, or you go to prayer, and for some reason you're just not getting anything from it? What do you do when the source of your comfort and hope seems to have dried up just when you desperately need it?

Let's say you lived in a place where all your water came from an old-fashioned well with a bucket and pulley. Every time you needed water, you would go to the well and let down the bucket, and take it back up full of fresh water. But one day you go to the well and let down the bucket, and when it comes back up there's nothing in it. It's empty. You try again and again, jerking the rope and making sure the bucket is really going all the way to the bottom, but still nothing.

At this point, do you give up and go start digging another well? Probably not. Why? Because it took a lot of work to dig this well down deep, and you've been drawing good water from it for years. It makes a lot more sense to get down there to the source that you've always drawn from and to find out what the problem is. It may be that something got into the well and blocked it up, or it may be that you need to dig down deeper to restore a good flow of water.

This is the same problem we have sometimes in our faith. Where we used to find comfort and encouragement after 10 or 15 minutes of reading the Scriptures or prayer, all of a sudden we find that even pressing on for a half-hour doesn't seem to make a difference in how we feel. We still come away dry and disappointed. But the source of life is still there. The refreshing hope and encouragement you felt in the past came from God, and God is still waiting behind His Word and is still waiting to be found in prayer. He has promised that we will find Him when we seek Him with all our heart. (Jeremiah 29:12-14.) He has promised to never leave you or forsake you. (Hebrews 13:5-6.) He never lies or changes His mind. And Jesus told us to keep on seeking God, for He will not delay long in answering our cries.

So keep on digging. Even when you're feeling dry, put your trust in the promises He made to us and keep on seeking Him. If a half-hour doesn't help, then find a way to make it an hour. If you don't find comfort on one day, keep on seeking Him the next day. Dry spells happen, and God always has a good reason for them (I'll talk about that in the next posts). Even so, they don't last if you keep on digging and seeking God to satisfy your thirst. God always intends every dry spell to lead to a closer, better relationship with Him:

For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.

(2 Corinthians 1:8-10.)