So... WE'RE MOVING TO MONTANA?

The CliffNotes version is this: We've been asked to be one of five staff couples involved in a start-up men's ministry in Montana called Mentoring Timothy. The hopeful, tentative goal is to move in about a year.

It will be a 10-month program in the mountains, with the primary purpose of giving young men a season of life after high school and before college in which they can unplug from the distractions of today, learn skills and live life in a challenging environment, be mentored by older men while observing marriage and family life, experience short-term international missions trips, and most of all, have the time to cease looking at the Bible as a textbook and learn to really develop a close and personal relationship with Jesus. It's life-on-life discipleship, plain and simple.

How and when and why did all of this transpire?  Read on!  :)

The last post I published on this blog was on November 9th.  I was milling over the fact that we hadn't really had a home since being married, and sharing thoughts as we were preparing to move from the RV to the basement of the yurt while finishing construction.  Mostly, I was thinking about how temporary even a "home" really is in light of eternity, and wrapped up with this:

Yes, I am cherishing this unsettled feeling and the reminder that it brings.  I am cherishing the sehnsucht... cherishing the longing. 

And when we have our own "home," it still will not be home.  Our brand new abode, in all spiritual reality, will not be home any more than the moldy house or the RV could be considered "home" right now. 

Always, always, always, I want to remember that.

There's no doubt in my mind that God had those thoughts swirling in my head during the entire building process for a good and specific reason.  How could we have possibly known how timely they would be?

The week we moved from the RV into the basement, we had begun praying seriously that the Lord would show us the next step for our lives. And it was that same week that we got a call from Dave Schroeder.

Dave was the Dean of Men when Joey and I attended NTBI,  and at our request, he and his wife Missy had been our premarital counselors in the months leading up to our wedding.  Shortly after we graduated, the Schroeders had left New Tribes in order to establish a new ministry God had planted firmly in their hearts; we've been aware of it for a few years. Now, Dave was calling to have us answer some preliminary questions and consider entering full-time ministry as staff with them.

Forms, references, a few hours of FaceTime, and many calls later, our little family packed into the car and drove out to Nebraska this past January for an interview with the board of Mentoring Timothy.  We were unanimously accepted.

Checking out Mt. Rushmore on the way back from Nebraska.

So many things happened all at once.  Very shortly after our return from Nebraska, we finished the house enough to be able to move up out of the basement.  After two years of waiting and RV living, it was surreal, hard to believe, and a bit of a fairytale.  It felt like too much luxury in so many ways (though you all know that our secondhand-materials-abode is far from opulent... haha).

We publicized our move into the house, and so many dear people rejoiced with us; all the while, we and family were the only ones who knew our future plans, and our hearts were already bracing to break away from this place.  We moved up with the bittersweet knowledge that we'll soon be moving on.

...I'd thought on many occasions, as I cooked on the campstove in the RV while wrangling a one-year-old and a newborn, that in so many ways it would be a loss to move into a house and get comfortable.  I asked Jesus, over and over again, not to let us lose that feeling of being unsettled, because it was such a great reminder that we're not to settle into this life... this world that's not our home.  Well, He answered those prayers with a YES.

Both of our immediate families are here in Wisconsin, and it's sad to think about taking our grandbabies away from their new grandparents.  Not to mention our church family, and my midwife... I know everyone does it.  It's common, and in a lot of ways, it's not a big deal.  But that doesn't make it easy.

From a young age, Joey and I have both known what it is to move over and over again.  I know what it's like to fix up a place that was dead, make it your own, scratch out a living there, and then leave.  But somehow, there's something different and more difficult about this.  We staked out an area that was just a patch of grass, dug a hole in the ground, and built a round house atop it for our family.  It does hurt to leave the home we've poured literal blood, sweat, tears, and so much more into for the last two years. Joey's fingerprints are on everything... We'd envisioned being able to rent it out and come back to it while visiting home, even if we ended up overseas as missionaries.  

A day or two after moving up, we just sat together by the fireplace one night as it all sank in, and cried.

It is strange to have these conflicting emotions-- to be weepy at the same time that we're genuinely over-the-moon thrilled for something that's so wonderful it seems like a dream come true.

I don't share all of this to seem pitiful or to convey that we're somehow suffering through this decision.  The purpose of sharing the inner sadness is only to to let you into our hearts a bit and to emphasize THIS: that as hard as it is to leave the house we haven't even finished yet, that feeling pales in comparison to the passion we have for this ministry, the excitement we have for the next step, and the utter sureness we have that this is where God is leading us.  It's only a house.  It's going to burn in the end.  All we're doing is giving up something that we can't keep anyway, that was never ours to hold onto.

There has been such a void in our society and churches of the strong, intentional mentoring of men.  Marriages are falling apart, pornography addiction is commonplace, and families are shattering.  Paul says in Thessalonians 3, speaking of believers, "...When I could bear it no longer, I sent to learn about your faith, for fear that somehow the tempter had tempted you and our labor would be in vain." As much as we have a heart to see the Gospel go where it has never been taken before, we also recognize the need for believers to be rooted, grounded, established, and thriving in Jesus, living out what they believe: discipled.  

Discipleship is something we have both been involved in and felt called to for years now, even when we were considering missions.  Thinking about our personal strengths and passions, it's mind-boggling how God has brought us to this place that in so many ways seems like our dream.  It is certainly something we never could have even imagined.  We pray that God will use this raw environment and the day-to-day of simple life for His glory, to raise up men of courage who love Him, love their churches, love their wives,  love their children, and are not afraid to lead boldly and love sacrificially.

"God said to Abram: Leave your country, your family, and your relatives and go to the land that I will show you."  

We'd both happened to read through or be reminded of Genesis 12 right around the time that all of this was first happening.  How amazing that we serve a God who brings encouragement at just the right time through words that were written centuries ago!

There is no way to know what the future holds.  For that matter, there's no way to know much about even the near future of this ministry and our involvement.  The goal is to move in about a year, and for so many reasons, it would be best to get out there as soon as possible; but we have no way of knowing how long it will take to raise support. We're trusting God to make that happen.  No idea when we'll be able to sell or rent our house.  The unknowns are countless.  Our confidence is not in anything except the firm belief that God is clearly leading us here right now, and we want to be faithful and obedient to His leading.  I don't have time to share all the unbelievable ways God is opening doors to make this ministry happen, beyond reason, and the things that have confirmed it for us personally along the way.  We have no idea what's in store, but we trust Him fully and are utterly thrilled to be on this adventure with Him!!

Designing and building our own home, only to leave it behind so quickly and start from the ground up all over again?  No, it doesn't make sense from a logical perspective.  But God's timing is perfect.  I believe that with all of my heart-- more than I believe that it will be hard to leave, more than I believe that the future is uncertain, and more than I believe that there are physically and spiritually difficult days ahead. His timing is perfect and He is a GOOD Father.  These are things I know beyond knowledge.  We are leaving our achey hearts in His ever-capable hands, knowing that we can trust Him implicitly.

We need so much prayer and would be immensely thankful if you'd partner with us in that way! Pray that we keep our eyes on Him daily, looking to Him for each step rather than taking grasp of this and just trying to run with it ourselves. The whole process will undoubtedly be incredibly humbling as well, so pray also that we respond well to God's sanctifying process in our lives.

We realize that a blog post doesn't answer all the questions, so please feel free to ask! You can call us, text us, email us, Facebook message us, or come on over and hang out. :)

If you'd like to receive our news and updates in the future, please note that they won't be here on the blog. Please send us your email address by any of the above avenues, or even just as a comment here.

Thank you for sharing in this journey with us, heart and soul! We deeply love you all.

View from the Lord-willing location of Mentoring Timothy.

An RV, a yurt, a moldy house, a tree house... and our eternal home.

(May 2015 excerpts from my journal, with some additional thoughts.)

My husband and I have been married for two years.  In those two years of marriage, we and our little family have moved six times.  (Depending on your definition of a "move...")

This "always in limbo, never settled" living situation has so many Heavenly parallels for the believer.  It feels familiar to me, because it is... As Christians we are, as the Bible has put it, sojourners; strangers in a strange land;  aliens.  Joey and I have not really had a place to call our own, yet.

And that's good.  I so love this very tangible, present reminder that these are the true circumstances of every believer:  Not home yet.  Not settled yet.  Not fully at peace or at home.  Only on the journey.

Our little family doesn't have "a place" for our belongings, really.  They're strewn, hither and yon, between different locations.  One place is the small house originally on our property... the one we intended to fix up before discovering that its foundation was completely shot, among other  issues that would have made it a financial black hole to invest in.  It was foreclosed due to severe mold issues (so we call it our "moldy house" to differentiate it from our tree house, our RV, "our" Neenah winter residence, and our future abode).

People involved in a realty scam broke into it twice after we bought the property but before we moved onto it.

All of that strikes a chord, as I am reminded of Matthew 6:19:
"Do not collect for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and thieves break in and steal."

Sometimes we chuckle to ourselves, amused that the majority of our belongings actually consist of the building materials collected for our eventual home.  And I'm reminded of another parallel.
"Collect for yourselves treasures in Heaven..."

What treasures do we have?  We have lots of convenient things.  A few sentimental things.  But if we lost everything in one big fire, I can't say I would be particularly sad to see most of it go.  I am glad for that.  That's not to say I don't truly appreciate our material belongings, but I like to think my heart isn't tied to them.  I think it's healthy to feel that way.  God's gracious hand has seen to it that the things I treasure most, in which I have thus far invested the greatest percentage of my life, are all things I get to "take with me" when I die.

Not having grown up with "treasures," at least not the way this world defines them (materialistically), I didn't develop a taste for them.  It can make me feel awkward and out of sync with humanity at times.  Sometimes I feel as if I have nothing to contribute to certain conversations.  (I've actually caught myself chiming in to complain about things I really don't mind at all, just for the sake of solidarity or fitting in, probably. I know: it's easy to recognize as completely stupid when I say it out loud.)  But, really, when I think about it, I should be alright with not caring about "things" or not always being able to engage in lively conversation about them very well.
"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

I want my Savior Himself to always, always be my treasure and my heart.  Not just mostly.  Not just a little more than the other things in my life, like my husband and my children.  I want Him to be very clearly the greatest and highest of anything I value.

A pastor once told me directly that it is foolish to talk about aching for Heaven or about just wanting to be with Jesus.  His reasoning?  Because Jesus gave us this world to enjoy, after all.

I can see the train of thought there.  But I also read my Bible.  And up against the perspective it offers, I see how teeny tiny, short, and insignificant all of human history will be in comparison to forever.  How much tinier, then, is my one life on the grand scale of eternity?!

Tell me something:  Why should I spend all of my time, energy, emotions, and resources garnering the applause of this world-- making myself successful or liked in the eyes of people, whose days are numbered, rather than making myself successful and faithful in the eyes of Jesus?  He's the One I will stand before one day, yearning to hear the words, "Well done......"

You might be proud of yourself for your credentials, your career, your life experiences, your "been theres..."  And I fully understand that temptation myself.  Right there with you.  Maybe you're a "do-gooder."  Maybe your life is wrapped up in public "ministry."  Maybe you consider yourself an intellectual.  Maybe you know everything there is to know about anything.  Maybe you're frankly just the most epic person in your circle of friends.  :P  Let's say you're a brain surgeon, a celebrity, a professional athlete, a United States ambassador, a military academy graduate, or an FBI agent.  [*insert your most-admired profession here*]

Cool.  But this earth and the entire system that gave you those experiences is going to burn.

What really matters?

You and I would be fools and borderline mental to treat this life like it's the one that matters most.  The only actions that matter in this life are the ones which have ramifications in eternity.

(And, no: In eternity, it's not going to matter that your husband made you late for church or that the kids spilled milk on the couch.  But how your heart responded in those circumstances will matter.)

It can be tempting to look back on one's life and think of how much more successful you could have been, or how much more "fulfilling" your life would be, had you made different decisions.  Certainly I was no exception.  Years back, when most of my friends were either in the military or well on their way to a four-year degree, I frequently thought of the opportunity I had to attend the Air Force Academy. I second-guessed the decisions I made regarding many other prestigious doors that had swung wide open to me.  Then Jesus altered my perspective.

And that's what makes all the difference in life.  He always does that when He touches a person's heart.  That's the turning point in so many events recorded all over the Bible, isn't it?  "...But God....."  Suddenly, a non-accredited Bible college with an emphasis on world missions and classes solely on the Word of God looked to me like one of the smartest investments possible.

Let me put it another way: I've heard people regret having married so young-- that they could have pursued their talents, had they put off starting a family.  Wives are bitter about their husbands "holding them back" from developing a career of their own, or parents lament their child having a medical condition that prevents them from ever following their dreams.  I've had my own relatives downplay to my face God's emphasis on taking the Gospel to other countries, because it simply didn't hold the same value as the comforts of home that they chose to pursue in life.

If you believe this life is all there is and all that matters, it makes sense to think that way.  If you genuinely believe God and what He says about eternity, it absolutely does not.

Are we living in light of eternity, today?  Do we do the simple, daily things for the glory of God?  Or have we "settled" into the short ride of this life, Church?

I am cherishing this "unsettled" feeling.  All my life, and especially as of late, I am constantly reminding myself, "This is just a small taste of how it feels to live free.  Live with a focus on Jesus and Heaven.  This is good.  Stay unattached to the things of this world, my soul.  Be forever clinging tightly to those things which will last: Jesus, His Word, and the eternal state of people's hearts."

I love traveling and living out of a suitcase... always have.  What we have now, however, is neither settled nor travel.  Isn't that what the Christian life looks like, too, though?  Sinking very shallow roots, living only temporarily, in circumstances that we know are not as ideal as they will be one day?

When the early church was persecuted and scattered, Peter addressed his letter to them this way:  "To the temporary residents of the Dispersion."  I love that.

Later, he essentially says, "If you call yourself a Christian, act like one."  But he puts it this way:  "If you address as Father the One who judges impartially based on each one's work, you are to conduct yourselves in reverence during this time of temporary residence." 

Isn't that exactly what a Christian is... a temporary resident?  Temporariness is all over the Bible.

Oh, this bittersweet tension between the already and the not yet!  Yes, we do have a house.  No, we cannot live there right now.  But we sure spend a lot of time and energy preparing to live there, and thinking about what life there will look like.

To be clear, I have absolutely loved living in this RV over the past couple of years.  In many ways, I will will miss it dearly.  But on "rougher" days when it's raining and my toddler has a 2-foot by 8-foot space to run around in, or I could really use a washing machine here, or I run out of gas for our camp stove in the middle of cooking (when we're having other people over for dinner), or I'm making instant rice in a coffee pot (hey, it works!), or a shower seems like paradise itself-- I remember many things.

One thing I think about is that we truly live in luxury compared to a huge part of the world.  Another is that I grew up under much more simple conditions, and it was good.  Yet another is this: the reality of what will be.  There will be a crib in that new house, for sleeping babies.  There will be the fire, and a couch, where Joey and I can curl up together at the end of a long day and be us.

Do we all do that, Heavenly-speaking?  When this life becomes difficult, do we always derive endurance and joy from looking to and really thinking about Jesus coming back and our forever-future?  Do we remind ourselves that we truly have a hope that most in this world do not have?  Do we remember that this is not nearly "as bad as it gets?"  Do we dwell on how unfathomingly beautiful eternity with Jesus will be?

Just ask my husband, who has had to expend a mind-numbing amount of thought and an exhausting amount of work on this project, and he'll tell you that this whole yurt-house-building saga has been proof that it is possible for your mind, energy, and focus to be wrapped up in someplace you don't even live.  (It's a fact that we've lamented because we want to be so much more eternally-minded, but it's a fact nonetheless.)  So let's do that with our someday-home, people.

That's how Paul says to weather this life.  In 1 Thessalonians 4 he describes Jesus' second-coming and how we will all be together with the Lord, and he concludes this way: "Therefore encourage one another with these words."  These words... Not words about how we should actually really be loving this life; not words which give a false hope that things here will get better.  This beautiful picture of what is coming... That is where we are to find encouragement.

People who consistently live with Heaven in view do not get bent out of shape by the little, circumstantial things.  They do not freak out when plans change and things go wrong.  People who take hard times in stride because they know hard times do not damage the sureness of their future... those people exude hope.  And hope is something for which this world is desperately searching.

Yes, I am cherishing this unsettled feeling and the reminder that it brings.  I am cherishing the sehnsucht... cherishing the longing.

But when we have our own "home," it still will not be home.  Our brand new abode, in all spiritual reality, will not be home any more than the moldy house or the RV could be considered "home" right now.

Always, always, always, I want to remember that.

"All I know is, I'm not home yet.
This is not where I belong."

Thoughts on the twenty-one who wear white robes.

"Let me tell you about the Christians of Egypt."

That's what I wanted to write about and reflect upon; to encourage and inspire my fellow believers with what I have seen in action, because it is more real than we comprehend when we only see it in the news.  I lived in Egypt for a significant period of time.  It was my privilege to sit in their churches, share in their communion, walk their streets, live their life, call it mine, and be called "Egyptian" by my brothers and sisters.  For so many reasons, I want to brag on the reality of the faith of the Christians there.  We could learn much from their example and have our perspective greatly improved by it.  It is very different from anything you may have ever seen.

But it will have to wait.  Right now, I am overcome with too many other thoughts.  So here they are, just thinking out loud, raw and open.

I am full of heartache.

Twenty-one Egyptians went to Libya simply to make a living.  Twenty-one seemingly common men.  Kidnapped by Jihadists, slaughtered to send a message to the rest of the Egyptian Coptic Church ("the nation of the cross") and the world.

I am full of heartache because these were sons, husbands, fathers... their heads severed on video; the water and the shore turned red with their blood.  They will never in this life see their families again.  They left young wives, children, and parents who will have to do life now without them.  It's heart-rending.  Grief unspeakable.

I am overflowing with joy and with love.

I am overflowing because the testimony left by the parents and wives of these men is bullet-proof.  The forgiveness they have shown toward the killers of their loved ones... the sheer joy they have exuded over the knowledge that Heaven is their new home... even the pride about the fact that all these men from their village were strong until the end and died for Jesus... It makes no sense because it is Christlike.  It is other-worldly.  It is Heavenly.

"And they overcame him [Satan] because of the blood of the Lamb and because of the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives even when faced with death."  (Rev 12:11)

"These [men] insisted to remain in unbelief," read the caption on the video.  Every one of these men had the chance to convert rather than die, and every one of them chose to die rather than dishonor their Savior.  Even with knives at their throats, they called out to the Lord Jesus who they knew they would be meeting soon.

I am overflowing.  There is hardly anything so sweet as pure faith in Jesus.  "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." (Psalm 115:16)

I am angry.

I am angry because while twenty-one precious believers were forced to the sand, their heads sawed off brutally with knives, all America could talk about was Fifty Shades of Grey.  Fifty Shades.  Of freaking.  Grey.  A movie that glorifies and celebrates violence, abuse, and rape.  A movie whose leading actors admit to hating themselves for even acting it out.  I want to tear my hair out by the roots.  My heart is sick.  So is my stomach.  Because all the body of Christ can do is argue about how the the worst thing you could possibly do is to be "judgy" about the movie.  All Christians can do is point the finger back at their brothers and sisters and say, "We have enough of our own problems!  How dare you get angry about this movie."  And that's just the Christians who aren't going to see the movie themselves.

Let me tell you something, American Christians.  Egyptian Christians would be shocked out of their minds to know that this movie does not anger you.  To know that too many of you would even consider seeing it.  In my mind's eye I can vividly see the faces of my close friends there... the blood draining from their mortified faces.  Confused.  Unable to believe that anyone claiming to follow Jesus could in any way justify not being outraged over such things.  They would be embarrassed even to talk about it.

I am angry because of the continual, unbelievable lies spewed and spread by our government.  The statement issued by the White House did not acknowledge that the victims were Christians.  The White House will not even use the term "radical Islam" because including Islam at all "would not be accurate."  Apparently, we may call it "terrorism," but it is terrorism that the leader of the free world says is "randomly" perpetrated.  People in that part of the world think he's a joke-- that he's either extremely ignorant, or a total liar.

Don't you dare tell us that this has nothing to do with religion when these Jihadists state, with every beheading, that they kill for the sake of Allah.  And don't you dare try to cover up the fact that this is persecution in its most obvious form.  The video was addressed to Egyptian Copts.  It was titled, "A Message Signed With Blood To The Nation of The Cross."  But, according to our government, it has nothing to do with targeting Christians.

This is absolutely nothing new.  But it is still disgusting.  The Church is called to endure persecution.  The government is called to end injustice.  God will hold every man accountable.

I am angry and concerned not only about the carnality and the easily-excused sin issues in our Western churches, but also about the sheer banality with which we seem to be so contented.  We spend morbid amounts of time on entertainment, alarming amounts of money on stuff we don't truly need, and a mortifying amount of energy making ourselves more happy and comfortable.  I'm angry about the status quo with which we are so comfortable.  How very wrapped up we are in mind-numbingly pointless discussions... activities... movies... humor... pastimes... celebrities... gossip... things that in the end of all things and in eternity simply. don't. matter.

It angers me that we throw around the term, "persecuted," and don't really understand it; that we all pay attention to the "big" incidents like this-- "wake-up calls," we call them-- but in between times, we forget all about the fact that our brothers and sisters are suffering around the world on a daily basis.  This is not some grand wake-up call, Christians.  Things like this, and far worse, have been happening ever since Lucifer pitted himself against God.  All throughout human history.  We may not be living through them in this particular country at this particular time, but we are utterly surrounded by such things.

Here's a question for us to ponder:  "What if it was me?"  What if it was my husband who was slaughtered on the southern shore of the Mediterranean?  What if my little boy's life was threatened before my eyes in an attempt to get me to deny my Savior?  I feel like we always read these stories about persecution and react with, "That's so sad!"  And we follow it up with, "I could never..." or, "I know I'd never have the courage..."  Why do we react like that?  Here's another question, if you find yourself thinking that way:  "What in my life needs to change?"  Why am I not at that place where I love Jesus so much and know Him so well that I would be certain of Heaven with a knife at my throat?  Why is my heart not so full of His forgiveness that I could extend that forgiveness to another?

It angers and saddens me that if the the time we spent with our fellow believers was truly "fellowship," few would actually enjoy it.  That if, when having other Christians over for dinner, we spent most of the evening in prayer, singing, worship, or actual edification, it would come off as weird.  Awkward.  Definitely unconventional.  Not a time of great joy and happiness and praising God-- the one thing that we would claim brings us together.  I promise you that the reason Jesus was on the lips of these twenty-one saints as their throats were slit is because they knew Him.  They loved Him; they lived for Him.  He was and is their Life.  He was real to them both in their quiet times and when gathered with their friends.  I miss that about the church in Egypt; miss living with my Christian friends and Jesus being so central.  I miss it with every beat of my heart.

I am full to the brim with hope.

I am hopeful, not in the way we commonly think of "hoping" as if it were a wish... not as when we say that "hopefully" something will happen.  I'm hopeful in the way that the epistles describe "our hope"-- certainty.  Complete and utter certainty about what is to come.

I am hopeful when I read the Book of Revelation.  I absolutely love that book.  I could read it every day and derive endless bounds of joy and hope and purpose because it gives us the big-picture perspective of the eternal.  We KNOW, people.  Unlike anyone who does not have our hope, we know what happens in the end!  Nothing should be a surprise to us in the meantime.  Things gets confusing and shocking when we start looking through our tiny, everyday-perspective lens too much.  There is nothing that is not going according to the overall, eternal plan.  God is not confused or shocked.

I am hopeful because torture and physical death cannot kill the soul.  It cannot kill love.  It cannot kill faith.  It cannot kill the resolve of Jesus followers-- it never has, and it never will.  Death, and all of Satan's armies, cannot kill the absolute certainty of God's cosmic plan for the ages and the fact that it will be accomplished.  It is irrevocably written into the story of the ages that Satan will be destroyed in the most majestic and epic war story of all time.  For now there is suffering, but never forget this:  Satan and all the enemies of God are going down in an event that will  be so much more than apocalyptic.

I am hopeful because even as Christians are killed, even as the Gospel is perverted, even as false teachers rise up and deceive millions, even though many who think they are Christians are not and successfully lead others astray... even as Satan is given reign over this world for a time, God is not mocked.  The Gospel is still going out, and people are still being saved.  His people are still His and He knows who they are.

Amid the tears, agony, injustice, and grief, there is joy, redemption, beauty, and a whole lot of hope.  There is still much to be done before Jesus' return, and it is only God's mercy and patience that allow more time for anyone who will believe to believe in Him and become a child of His.

Christians, we are all given different gifts and roles in life, but we all share the same purpose.  Let us stay connected closely to our Life source, fight the good fight, finish the race, and keep the faith.  Let us live every day to hear the sweetest words we could ever hear from our Father:  "Well done, good and faithful servant."

"The fields are white  unto harvest."

"Even so, come, Lord Jesus!"

Horrifying Dreams.

A couple of mornings ago, I awoke after dreaming (for what felt like the entire night) about being hunted down like an animal. The worst thing was that there were others being pursued, too. With me were members of my family, friends and other believers. We were hiding in the cracks and crevasses of stone walls, near dumpsters in back alleys, abandoned basements. We were running out of locations and ways to conceal ourselves.

It wasn't wartime, and it wasn't in another country. It was in the U.S.

They were not random criminals, but those employed by the government - the established laws of the land - who were coming after us.

I knew somehow that their intent was to execute us, but only after a great deal of torture and digging for information.

And I knew for a fact that it was because I had broken some law because of my belief in Jesus. Maybe owning a Bible, maybe praying with people. Maybe, just being a Christian.

As a child, I once had a dream which I cringe even to share. In this dream, again, Christians were being persecuted-- in this case, butchered by being sawed in half. You may think that I watched one too many horror movies, except that we didn't watch movies when I was a kid. Much later, I read a passage in Hebrews chapter 11 that described what some believers had endured for holding on to their faith in Jesus, with the same word pictures:

"They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented..."

Whether this account took place in the time of Antiochus or perhaps Manasseh, we know that Christians around the world suffer like this every day. America is pretty much the last physically safe place for Christians. Reality is that the rest of the world deals with this; we're one of the only countries which does not currently experience discrimination and physical persecution as the norm and reality. The reputation, favor and "rights" we have enjoyed for centuries, however, are quickly disappearing.

Dreams and thoughts like this are not the least bit comfortable. They're absolutely frightening. But they should not fill us with dread of the future. They should propel us into the arms of Jesus.

To where else can we go?

These miserable dreams got me thinking about my own heart and where I stand. It is always healthy to have a reality check and ask ourselves tough questions, no matter where we stand with God. Our flesh is and will always, always be prone to wander away from Him.

My thoughts on this mirror ones I wrote on this blog previously, and serve to remind myself of those I put in the post "The Quest For Love:"

When I was growing up, I read a few stories from Foxe's Book of Martyrs. I still regularly read the Voice of the Martyrs magazine. I used to wonder what it was that kept such Christians faithful through gruesome torture and death. I admired what I assumed was their steely willpower.

Willpower doesn't do that - everyone has a breaking point! Memorization and indoctrination cannot do that... torture can wear down every human faculty. Love does that. Not theoretical love, but actual love. How many of us would die for something we don't know to be true? How many of us, outside of the military sense, would readily die for a total stranger? How about someone we'd met once? Now how about family, or a close friend? I'd give my very life for my little brother. My mom, or my dad. An Egyptian girl I know, who is like a sister to me . (Just as examples.) Why? They're not just names. I LOVE them. I know them.

It's possible to be acquainted with the Lord, to be saved by Him, yet not know Him (how sad!) "Have I been so long with you, and yet hast thou not known me?," Jesus asked Philip.

We have got to know Jesus. If we don't, why in the world do we bother with the religious rigamarole? What, then, does the concept of heaven even hold for us? What is the point of being "saved" - to spend eternity with someone we do not know, much less love?? "Your love is better than life," the Psalmist, David, says. Wow! Think about that literally (the Bible does mean every word of what it says). Do we have that kind of "attachment" to God? God holds in His heart the deepest possible, beyond imaginable love for us, but He does not force it on us. We have to want it. We have to seek Him. Psalm 145:18 says, "The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth." James 4:8 says, "Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you." That's not a "maybe"... it's a promise!

By the way, trusting someone comes easily once you really know them. I wouldn't ask that you trust a stranger. God doesn't, either. I trust Him with my life [...] because I trust Him - trust Him to do what really is best for me, not what I think is best for myself. How could I not!? Is it not tragic that we claim to live for a God with whom we refuse to entrust our circumstances?? 

...There is a space, deep in the heart of every human being, which cannot be filled even by a spouse. There is a love we crave with every ounce of our aching souls, regardless of whether or not we're painfully aware of it. A space which can only be filled by God himself. And so often, even we Christians mistake it for a longing for the human love we chase, not realizing that even once we attain it we will be unfulfilled. We were made for something so much more: something perfect. And once we have it, I don't see how there could be any going back. Everything else really does, of a sudden, pale in stark contrast.  

Does that sound like hollow spiritual rhetoric? It did to me, once upon a time. It always does, until it becomes personal and tangible.

Tears fill my eyes at the thought of how many "followers of Christ" have never experienced Him... never gotten close to Him as to a closest friend or a Father... indeed, never known Him. 

Some Christians go to church a few times a year. The good ones, every Sunday. The really great ones volunteer during the week and get involved in ministry, or go on missions trips, right? Even at home they study the Bible, but as they would a textbook, and utter one-way prayers into the air, like a ritual. 

I've been there.

Is that it? Is that worth it? Isn't a relationship two-way?

How many of us have a personal God? How many of us can say, with every possible bit of sincerity, that He is our closest friend, the One we most want to please and most hate to disappoint - that there is nothing and no one we love more? It's one thing to say it. It's another thing to actually feel it, and yet another to fully know it.

Yes, we've got to plug into good, solid, Bible-teaching churches, and have our "quiet time" or "devos" or whatever you personally call it. Yes, we've got to be careful about what we watch, listen to, and otherwise feed on so that we don't pollute our minds and hearts with junk and make ourselves numb to sin. Yes, we've got to share the Gospel from personal testimony with our friends, neighbors, acquaintances. And yes, we've got to surround ourselves with other believers who love Jesus and actually talk about Him and His Word and our struggles together so that we will grow and strengthen and flourish in Him. But it's got to be even more than that. It's got to be all of ourselves, and by that I mean our hearts. It's got to be real. Nobody dies for something or someone they cannot swear is real.

The part-time Christianity thing is like part-time breathing!

Is this hard? YES! It's more than that. It is impossible with the Holy Spirit of God. And it will not even seem worth it unless we are in a genuine relationship with Jesus-- I speak from personal experience.

If you have the desire to know Jesus more and just don't make it a priority, the time is now. Things will not get easier, they will get harder. Our flesh and the Spirit fight a vicious battle til the day we die; if we quit even trying, we're giving up ground, not just calling truce for awhile.

[I know how hard it can be! Yesterday morning I had plenty of time, so I convinced myself I needed to listen to this one song on YouTube at the beginning of my quiet time. ...Which was phenomenal, edifying and would have been really great, except that then somehow (still don't know how), I ended up on Facebook. ("She what!?" Yes. I'm an idiot.) Did I seriously just tell Jesus He had to wait?? For Facebook?!? I would never say that. But I did it. (This is why my quiet time is normally the first thing. Otherwise, the days starts and all of a sudden there's no time.)]

If you've been play-acting, maybe it's time to stop. It's easy to act the part and even think it's real when you've grown up in a Christian home or it's all you've ever known. I knew a girl a few years back who recently posted on her blog that she has finally "broken up with God," which she considers to have been "an abusive relationship." She watched as her other Christian friends enjoyed deep, real relationships with God, but for all of her praying and Bible-reading, did not experience it herself. She resents the lifestyle she has led, because it has been an act.

My initial tears and aching heart on her behalf (and grief over God's character being so maligned) were tempered by Joey reminding me that it's a step in the right direction. She has become honest with herself about where she stands with God. She's no longer pretending. And for that I have thanked God.

We cannot surround ourselves with the things of this world, put time into knowing God on the side, and expect that He's going to give us this massive, overwhelming love for Himself. He doesn't just special-deliver a box marked, "Awesome relationship with Me" one day. If you have no desire to really know Him, ask Him for it! Ask other believers to ask Him for it for you! Pursue Him. Maybe (this is gutsy), ask Him to use whatever it takes to make you desperate for Him.

By way of lengthy conclusion...:

One good thing I have witnessed about persecution is this: It brings the believer face-to-face, raw and real-time, with what he does or does not believe. It's one thing to go through the motions when all it means is looking like a good Christian in America. But when looking like a Christian means you stick your neck straight out onto the chopping block, well, you think twice about whether or not you consider Jesus to be worth it.

I don't believe that anyone gets through gruesome persecution and torture on one's own. I fully believe that God gives grace and strength in the moment. Which means that our job is to be connected to our God. We have to "abide in the Vine." When all is said and done, He is the only thing worth living for. He is the only reality.

Which means that Facebook can wait. So can whatever we have planned. Let's spend some time with Jesus.