This year has been a time of perseverance for me.

What is interesting about perseverance is that most of the time it is a choice. The desire to quit and give up and stop toiling is right there and much more attractive than persevering through hardship, suffering, and uncertainty.

Really, what is there to gain from perseverance?

On the surface, nothing. At the moment, pain is most likely still present, deep challenges and obstacles appear stacked up and never ending. There doesn’t seem to be any way for this pain and these challenges to dissipate or to improve. This is why perseverance is a choice, because circumstances often present a clear path to immediate ease of pain and relief from suffering. Yet, many of us choose perseverance! Why should we? What prompts us to think that being long sufferers or steadfast is going to get us anything? Shouldn’t we just cut our losses and find a new path?

The Bible doesn’t see perseverance as something to avoid but to embrace. In fact, perseverance seems to be an essential part of our Growing Up. Paul, in a letter to the Christians in Rome, says that we should “glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” James uses even more elaborate language. He says, “Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him.”

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If we are to believe these great men of God and writers of his holy scriptures, then character, hope, blessing, and some kind of great honor known as the crown of life is promised to those who persevere under suffering. Truth be told, if you began to analyze characters from the Bible you would find story after story of perseverance and endurance in their faith. From Abraham to John, one of the great themes of the Bible is how true faith in God is tested and strengthened through perseverance.

These reminders illustrate to me that I hinder my growth and maturity in my Christian life when I refuse to persevere. If I choose not to persevere, then I could be choosing to miss out on all that Christ has in store for me.

So, I need to sacrifice my current comfort, my near pleasures, and my quick fixes for the promise of abiding joy, strength of character, and anticipated good outcome sometime in the future. This is hard work, and some days I don’t think I have it in me, but I feel called to persevere to obtain the best that God has to offer.

What are you being called to persevere in?

I can probably name all of the appearances Jesus made after his resurrection. What I haven’t done is analyze the context of his appearances. He didn’t come busting through walls like the Kool Aid man, he never wowed anyone first with a fancy trick, he refrained from personal confrontation. Instead, he did the following:

• He visited his friends. Jesus’ resurrected body was not a apparition or a ghost, he wasn’t around to haunt his enemies or confront those that sent him to death. He preferred to reassure Thomas, reconcile with Peter, and comfort Mary.
• He preferred to be barely noticed. Mary mistook him for a gardener, the friends on the road to Emmaus spent miles with him and didn’t notice who he was, and he tarried in the distance cooking breakfast while the disciples fished.
• The context of his appearances were rather ordinary. Appearing in a garden, walking along a road, preparing breakfast in the early morning, stopping by in an upper room. These were just normal locations in normal settings. There was nothing sensational or amazing about the context of the conversation or the encounter.

Frederick Buechner, our great theologian of the midst of life, states:

In other words, it is precisely at such times as these that Jesus is apt to come, into the very midst of life at its most real and inescapable. Not in a blaze of unearthly light, not in the midst of a sermon, not in the throes of some kind of religious daydream, but…supper time, or walking along a road. This is the element that all the stories about Christ’s return to life have in common….

The sacred moments, the moments of miracle, are often the everyday moments, the moments which, if we do not look with more than our eyes or listen with more than our ears reveal only… the gardener, a stranger coming down the road behind us, a meal like any other meal. But if we look with our hearts…what we may see is Jesus himself, what we may hear is the first faint sound of a voice somewhere deep within us saying that there is a purpose in this life, in our lives…

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I find it reassuring that I am more likely to encounter Jesus as I drive and walk into my workplace than I am in some burst of knowledge or words written in the sky. Also, that Jesus is concerned about the ordinary and even seems to prefer it. He certainly can use the miraculous and the profound but he isn’t above using a meal or some kids running around or an ordinary argument among friends.

We could be missing God’s voice and purposes and direction because we expect something grander and amazing. Perhaps Jesus wants us to recognize “the miracle of one instance of our precious life to the miracle of the next.”

My go to prayer the past few weeks is incredibly simple. It only has three lines but in those three lines, I am able to express faith in God’s power, intercession for others, and a hope for a glorious future.

I discovered the prayer from listening to an audio version of James Bryan Smith’s book, The Magnificent Journey. I have now adapted the prayer to include myself, activities, and difficult situations. The prayer goes like this:

Father, may your will be done in ___________’s life today.

May _________ be well today.

May _________ find Joy and Peace today.

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First, I am praying that what God wants done is done in this person’s life. That they have nothing happen to them that is not what God intends. Sometimes, I will drop the use of the word “today” and include a time more specific or open ended.

Second, I am praying for their body and spirit to be protected and whole. I am praying that their thinking not be distorted or misguided and that God provides fullness and fulfillment in their life.

Third, I pray that what becomes a reality in their life is a sense of ultimate well being and a contentment in their circumstances. I am praying that what truly satisfies is present and that God’s presence reminds them of all that is good and possible in this life for today and for all their days.

Perhaps the true effectiveness of this prayer is not in the words but in the simplicity and ease of it. I quickly memorized it and began saying it throughout my day. Almost once an hour, I will say the prayer for a person, then myself, and then a situation I find myself in. Even if I am horribly distracted, burdened, or upset, I am usually able to slow down and voice this prayer for those three things.

If you need a recharge to your prayer life or struggle to know what to pray for, I would encourage you to try this prayer. It has been a profound part of my spiritual life over the last month.

Have you ever thought about the power that man has?

Man can create, organize, build, and achieve but man can also destroy. Man’s power to destroy is constantly on display. From bomb marked city-scapes to scandals that take down entire corporations, there seems no end to man’s power to destroy. Man can also destroy marriages, friendships, families, and themselves.

Frederick Buechner points out that man’s power, as great as it is, only works from the outside, externally. “A man has power from the outside to push, pull, prod, and mold other men to his liking, for his good or for theirs, but it is only the outside of these other men that his power can affect.” Buechner goes on to illustrate that the most powerful person in the world, as great as this person’s influence and control, still couldn’t satisfy the deepest longing of his own personal soul or that of anyone else’s. The longing that each of us has for love, for deep peace, and meaning can never be satisfied by man’s efforts, no matter the autonomy, freedom, or power. “All man’s power is powerless because at its roots, of course, the deepest longing of the human soul is the longing for God, and this no man has the power to satisfy.”

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The Bible makes the bold claim that God is love. Dwell on that claim for a second. If this is true then all forms of love that we have as humans, as distorted as they may be, does not come from ourselves but are a reflection of God’s love. In other words, love is not one of man’s powers. Man can only yield its power externally but cannot reach into the heart, to our deepest selves, only God can do that. This is his power to satisfy and to bring true healing, to bring life-giving love, to hold things together, to restore.

Trying to operate in man’s power to achieve what only God can bring will only cause your world to feel small, closed in, and dark. But the power of God’s love expands your world, opens you up to receive love from others, brings light to the dark, helps you get up when you are down and generates peace when it is nowhere to be found.

Ultimately, which would you rather have? Man’s power or God’s power?

I originally posted this two Easters ago but it is such a great reminder for me I may just make it an Easter tradition.

I have spent so much time in the last few months reflecting on the teachings and miracles of Jesus that I felt like I was ill prepared for Easter week. I wanted to feel connected to the reality of Jesus’ last days, his crucifixion, and resurrection. I immediately thought of a book I read several years back called Unapologetic by Francis Spufford. His chapter on Jesus is one of the most powerful things I have ever read. His description of Jesus’ crucifiction is the kind of raw, stark, and beautiful thing I needed this week. So, I thought I would share a few of Spufford’s words and offer a little meditation for us to get in line with the level of love and sacrifice present in Easter week. More to come this week.

Daylight finds him in a procession again, but this time no one could mistake him for a king. He’s stumbling along under the weight of his own instrument of execution, a great big wooden thing he can hardly lift, with an escort of the empire’s soldiers, and the bystanders who’ve come blinking out of the lodgings where they spent the festival night don’t see their hopes, or even the possibility of their hopes, parading by. They see their disappointment, they see their frustration…

Place yourself in the crowd that morning. What is going through your head as Jesus stumbles by? Are you saddened? Angry? Ashamed? Disappointed? Relieved? Glad? Are you being swept away by the jeers and cat calls from those around you? Do you want to spit at him like the person beside you? Or are tears rolling down your face? The pure humiliation of Jesus’ parade through the streets is shocking compared to the promise of just a few days before. Isn’t that just like us humans. We will turn on a person for no good reason other than our personal preferences weren’t met that day and we might as well take it out on something or someone.

…he’s turning his bruised face toward the whole human crowd, past and present and to come, and accepting everything we have to throw at him, everything we fear we deserve ourselves. The doors of his heart are wedged open wide, and in rushes the whole pestilential flood, the vile and roiling tide of cruelties and failures and secrets. Let me take that from you, he is saying. Give that to me instead. Let me carry it. Let me be to blame instead. I am big enough. I am wide enough. I am not what you were told… I am the father who longs for every last one of his children. I am the friend who will never leave you. I am the light behind the darkness…

What do you fear you deserve? What has my sin done? What should be in store for me? Jesus takes the blame. He embraces our faults and takes them in on himself. That is the picture of Jesus as he heads to the cross.

Have you seen the Still Face experiment? It is movingly powerful. It shows a mom and baby happily interacting, connecting and enjoying each other’s company. Then the mom is instructed to turn back to the child with zero expression on her face. Then for two minutes the infant starts to stress out and is visibly disturbed that the mom is not showing the affectionate attention that the baby expects. The point is to show the power of engaged, loving attention and the damage it can cause when it is not present. (See the video below)

I had this video in the back of my mind recently when I read Mark 10, which contains two stories that seem to have nothing in common but actually are connected to one another beautifully. The first story is of Jesus surrounded by children who seem to be getting on the disciples last nerve. Then, in the story that follows, Jesus is approached by a young, rich and powerful man who wants to know the secrets to the spiritual life.

I had never compared and contrasted the story of Jesus with the little children and the story that follows it. In the first story, the children are being rebuked by the disciples but Jesus makes the statement that no one will enter the Kingdom of God unless they receive it like little children. He says that the Kingdom of God belongs to “such as these.” You see, these children couldn’t stay away from Jesus. There was something about the way that Jesus interacted and accepted them that seemed to make all of the difference in the world, despite the disapproval of the adults on the scene.

If the point of the scene with the children is hard to grasp, it is perfectly illustrated by the story of the rich young man. He is an obedient, faithful person who still wants more and can’t even recognize when what he wants is right in front of him. In a moment of tenderness, Jesus even looks on him and scripture says, “loves him.” The children would have taken this look and that love and been perfectly content but the man ignores Jesus’ look of love and the words that come with it.

The man, the adult, has lost the ability to accept Jesus’ love and life as all that he needs. He has Jesus’ full attention and even an interaction of love and acceptance, exactly what the children knew was worth being present for, and that wasn’t enough.

For us, we dismiss the interactive, loving, and present Jesus for things that we conclude we really need. Instead of, with childlike eyes, take what is right in front of us. Our adult preferences, pride, and know-it-all nature cloud the simple, yet transformative, presence of Christ looking at us and loving us. Jesus’ look and love are enough, I don’t need to add-on to that.

Like a baby who craves a parent’s affectionate attention, what we need is Christ and his attention and he so longs to give it to us.

I don’t always enjoy reading scripture. Some days the thought of spending one minute in silence sounds excruciating. If prayer is supposed to be a conversation with God, then my side of the conversation is haphazard, stunted, disjointed, and superficial. What I am trying to say is that the spiritual life isn’t always pleasant or full of rich experiences. Sometimes it just feels like a chore.

What has fascinated me recently is the process more than the finished product.

Established artist and writers understand the process much better than others. David Bayles and Ted Orland in their book, Art and Fear, state, “To all viewers but yourself, what matters is the product: the finished artwork. To you, and you alone, what matters is the process: the experience of shaping the artwork.” Jerry Seinfeld doesn’t set out to write stand-up comedy routines, he just tries to write a joke a day. Success for him is his calendar full of red X’s showing each of the days he was able to write a joke. Similarly, writing tips talk about sitting down daily and just writing and not trying to perfect or edit until you have gotten a set number of words or pages completed. What is important is the act, the discipline, the reps, the practice.

So, why is it in our spiritual life, we read a couple of scriptures, say a couple of prayers, read a devotional whenever we get around to it and expect the finished product of our lives to be developed and mature and noteworthy? Was great art or a great athletic team or a great leader developed by just dabbling in their craft?

The spiritual life, so much more than other areas, requires off-the-spot training. For example, by spending time understanding Jesus’ sacrifice or studying love or working through our need for humility, this allows us preparation off-the-spot that assists us to be Christlike on-the-spot.

It is like Danny LaRusso from the original Karate Kid toiling away washing Mr. Miagi’s car and painting his fence. It all seemed pointless and ineffective until Mr. Miagi began sparing with him and the moves he had ingrained in his body through the chores of washing and painting were able to withstand and react with precision and effectiveness. The practice off-the-spot allowed him to perform on the spot.

I have seen this happen in my own life. Not in every case, for their are many areas where there is still great work to do, but when faced with deep struggle or challenge, I realize that have some of the spiritual resources and capacity to handle these obstacles because of the work I have done in practice and developed through the process.

If you are not seeing the spiritual results you expected God to have changed by now, perhaps you are not paying enough attention to the process of devoting energy, intention, time, and resources to Growing Up in Christlikeness. Care about this process, be committed to it. God will honor it and the Holy Spirit will guide you in it. Not just for achievement sake but for benefit of your personal well-being and those around you.