Category Archives: Healthy Faith

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How to Fight Your Sin

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We all struggle with something.

We all sin or have some emotion we wish we didn’t have. We carry regrets and shame from past hurts, relationships, or other experiences we hope to eliminate. But for some reason, they hang around. 

We often wonder, am I made new? Has God forgiven me for that? Why do I still struggle (Romans 7:15)? Why do I do what I do?

How to stop doing the things you wished you could stop doing.

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Throughout Scripture (Romans 8:13; Galatians 5:24; Colossians 3:5), we are told to crucify our sin, to put it to death.

But what does that look like?

Right before Galatians 5:24, Paul has two lists: a list of sins (vs. 19 – 21) and a list called the fruit of the Spirit (vs. 22 – 23).

In vs. 19 – 21, there is sexual immorality (which is all sex outside of the bounds of marriage between a man and a woman), impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies and things like these.

What is interesting about this list is that Paul seems to put them all on the same level and says, “Living in these will keep you from God” (see the end of Vs. 21). 

What Paul says, though, is these are not occasional sins. In vs. 16 – 17, he describes these as overwhelming, all-encompassing desires that you cannot control the longing of. They are your identity. These things about us follow words like “always” and “never.” I always worry, try to control things, and care what others think. I can never stop this or that. 

Those things slowly become part of our identity, which we carry as part of ourselves. 

For each person, vs. 19 – 21 is where the battle happens. And make no mistake, we all have something. 

But how do you put them to death?

This is where the fruit of the Spirit comes in vs. 22 – 23 of Galatians 5 and the freedom promised to us in Romans 8. 

I love that Paul calls them fruit. It gives this picture of a farmer, of gradual growth; a farmer, not the fruit, does that. The fruit doesn’t make itself grow; God does. Fruit does grow. Not always at the rate we expect or think it should, but it grows.

How God works in our lives.

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The question for a follower of Jesus is, do you see growth in your life in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control? Do you see how God is working on your heart in those areas?

We take the fruit of the Spirit and put our sin to death from vs. 19 – 21.

This becomes a daily thing.

Crucifixion in vs. 24 carries this idea that it will be a death. It will be painful, complex, and complicated. Freedom always involves a war.

Freedom always involves a war.

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One of the best ways to walk this road is through confession. We practice confession daily, each week, at the communion table. Why? Because “when we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). 

One thing I’ve learned about God’s grace is that many times, the reason we don’t experience God’s grace and freedom in Jesus is that we won’t allow ourselves to. 

We too often choose to stay stuck in our sins. This is why Paul talks so much about the mind in the New Testament (Romans 8:5, 12:1 – 2; Colossians 3:12). The daily choices make up our lives, and that pertains to the choices we make to sin or not sin. Paul tells us that we have the power to conquer all that lies before us (Romans 8:11), but many of us live already defeated lives. 

What if, this week, you lived as if the Spirit that raised Christ from the dead lives in you? Because He does. 

How to fight your sin.

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5 Questions About Prayer

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Photo by Timothy Eberly on Unsplash

One of the questions many people wrestle with is, “Does prayer work?” Many of us have prayed for something: healing, a wound to be taken away, a relationship to be restored, only to have it not answered.

We have also seen moments when we prayed for something, and that prayer wasn’t answered the way we expected it.

This leaves us to ask, “Does prayer work? Is prayer even worth the time and effort?”

In James 5:13 – 20, James lays out how to pray, the role of the unconfessed in prayers, and how a church should gather to pray together.

This passage is often used to pray for the sick, which it is about. But the word for sick in James 5 doesn’t just mean physically ill but also includes spiritual and emotional weakness. This is one reason James uses the example of Elijah because Elijah was spiritually and emotionally weak in 1 Kings. That idea completely changed my thoughts about this passage and my prayer life as I prepped this message. 

In chapter 5, James gives us five questions to ask so that we can see prayer be more effective in our lives: 

5 reasons why prayer doesn’t work.

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Are you self-made and have little need for God? Many of us are self-made, able to work hard, strategic thinkers, or people who can feel our way out of things.

Without realizing it, we create lives that have little need for the power of God.

This begs the question of when we start praying about something and how long it takes us to ask God for help.

Do you see the hard and good times as things God has allowed? In James 5, James talks about Job and Elijah as examples for us to understand his point. Job said, “God gives, and God takes; blessed be the name of the Lord.” James wants us to see how this interacts with our prayers. Do we see the good and the hard as from God? Or just the hard?

Do you pray for your will and not God’s? Jesus taught his disciples in Matthew 6 that when they pray, they are to pray for God’s will, not their own.

But one of our frustrations with prayer is that God doesn’t answer us on our timetable or the way we want.

This is the crux of prayer. Because we will often ask for A, and God gives us B. The question we have to wrestle with is, do we believe God heard us? Do we believe God spoke to the other person? This is when we are reminded how little control we have in life, and that’s hard. 

Do you pray specifically? I know it can be scary to pray specifically because I am opening myself up to being let down or opening myself up to potential doubts and struggles. What if I ask for this specific healing and don’t get it? What if I ask God to do this or that, and it doesn’t happen?

That’s hard. 

But the example that James uses is Elijah, who was a man who prayed specifically. He was also a very flawed man, which is also incredibly encouraging. 

Do you live in unconfessed sin? Unconfessed sin creates a barrier between you, God, and others. And James tells us it is a hindrance to our prayer lives. James connects the confession of sin to answered prayer and healing. 

This is important because the healing we are promised is spiritual, physical, and emotional, but we aren’t promised when that healing will come, just that we will have it. 

5 questions to ask about your prayer life.

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What Happens While we Wait on God

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Photo by Semyon Borisov on Unsplash

 

You will find yourself waiting on God at some point in your life.

We will often find ourselves waiting for God to answer a prayer, to speak to us and give us direction, or maybe you find yourself waiting for God to provide you with a reason for the season of pain or difficulty you are in.

What we do in those moments might be some of the most critical moments of our faith journey. Those are the moments when God is doing a lot in us, even if we don’t see it at the time.

In James 5, James gives us a few things to be aware of and ask ourselves while we wait:

4 questions to ask while you wait on God.

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Am I controlling what I can control and releasing what I can’t?

Farmers in the first century didn’t have irrigation systems or even weather radars to know when a storm was coming. They were utterly dependent on the rain. They had to lean into what they could control and what they couldn’t.

We will often feel like we are utterly powerless in life or overestimate how much power we have.

One exercise that has been helpful to me is one Henry Cloud suggests in his book Necessary Endings: list out what you control and what you don’t control in a situation. You might find that you have control and agency over some things you didn’t think and you might find yourself worrying over something you have no control over.

Am I being patient?

James uses the example of a farmer to show us something important while we wait: the kind of patience we are to have.

Farmers cannot make crops grow, but they can do things while waiting.

Patience isn’t something we usually want (at least I don’t), but we must lean into it because things do not change or grow quickly.

James tells us to be patient in our suffering and difficulty, for the Lord’s return is near. This is a reminder that all we are going through will one day be made right, be made new, and that everything we are going through is under the rule and reign of God, which is why James harkens back to the story of Job.

Am I strengthening my heart?

Then he tells us to strengthen our hearts because the Lord’s return is near.

We strengthen our hearts by being in the word of God, by spending time with Him, listening to Him and speaking to him, casting our cares on Him (1 Peter 5:7), and sharing our sighs with him (Psalm 5:2).

We also strengthen our hearts in community, being with people who can help to encourage us and spur us on, but who can also help us carry our burdens and point out when we need to have things pointed out to us to grow in our faith. 

Am I guarding my heart?

James then switches gears in verse 9 to tell us to guard our hearts. 

Why?

While we are waiting and walking through pain and difficulty, we are vulnerable. 

He says: Brothers and sisters, do not complain about one another, so that you will not be judged. Look, the judge stands at the door!

That vulnerability can lead us to complain about each other, judge each other, criticize people or take judgment into our own hands. 

James says, be on guard. 

This is important because, amid our pain, frustration, and hurt, we can easily hurt those around us and take our anger out on them. 

4 questions to ask yourself if you’re going through a hard season.

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What is God doing in you now as you walk forward in a hard season?

It is easy to look forward, to look for a reason for it, but God is looking to grow us in those moments. 

Pete Scazzero said, “To mature in Jesus and learn true faith requires we go through walls, dark nights, and valleys. There is no other way.”

To mature in Jesus and learn true faith requires we go through walls, dark nights, and valleys. There is no other way. -Pete Scazzero

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Finding God’s Hand

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The other day in my Bible reading, I was in Matthew 11—the story of when John the Baptist was in prison.

I imagine that John is struggling and trying to figure out what God is doing in his life and the world around him. He sought to do what God called him to do and ended up in prison for it.

He hears reports of all Jesus is doing, yet John is still in prison.

So, John sent his disciples to ask Jesus, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”

This is a question many of us ask at different points.

If you are a pastor, you see how God works in another church, city, or state and wonder, “Why there and not here?”

You see the life and marriage of someone else and see God’s hand and wonder, “Why them and not me?”

This is the first question of faith for many of us, why does God seem to be active there but not here?

And it isn’t that God is only active there, but that it is often more apparent to us when God is active in someone else’s world than being able to see His activity in our world.

It is often more obvious to us when God is active in someone else’s world than being able to see his activity in our world.

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Part of this struggle is learning to celebrate when God works somewhere you aren’t a part of. As pastors, we should be grateful that churches other than ours are growing, but that can be hard. 

One of my favorite small group practices is sharing evidence of God’s grace: going around the table and sharing where we’ve seen God at work in the past week. When I struggle to see God’s hand, hearing how God is at work in the life of others reminds me that God is at work. 

It also helps me look harder at my life and see what God is doing. 

Then Jesus says something in verse 6 that I’ve always found curious: Blessed is anyone who does not stumble because of me.

We will struggle with faith when God doesn’t do what we think He should or want Him to do. 

Many of us had a crisis in our faith when God didn’t answer a prayer, heal someone or ourselves, or change something. That is the moment when our trust becomes real. 

 

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4 Questions To Ask About God’s Will

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Photo by Patrick Fore on Unsplash

Recently, I preached on James 4:13 – 17 and the power of numbering our days and making the most of every moment. 

We all live with regrets, missed opportunities, ones we wish we could redo or go back and undo. 

We can’t. We can’t go back and change the past; we can only ensure we don’t miss what is ahead as we move forward. But how do we do that? 

Some of us get paralyzed when we think about decisions or how to figure out God’s will for our lives. I believe some basic things can help us discern God’s will for our lives, but I have learned over the years that a few questions have helped to clarify it in my life:

4 questions to ask to figure out God’s will.

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What does God’s word say? 

This might seem obvious since we are talking about God’s will. But, many of us ignore what God’s word has to say regarding marriage, work, finances, integrity, or other aspects of life. Then we wonder why God isn’t being clear in our lives.

I wonder if we did what God called us to do, the things He’s already told us in Scripture; I think it would be more precise what decisions we should or should not make. 

It is also easy to read something in Scripture, get the sense that the Holy Spirit is speaking to us, and then ignore that, or think about how it doesn’t apply to me or my situation. 

What does trusted community say?

These are the mature Christians in your life who are wiser than you, and care about you but aren’t impressed by you. They are willing to say the hard things to you. The ones who can look you in the eye and tell you that you are missing something, and you will listen to them. 

This could be a boss, a spouse, a friend, etc. 

If you’re married, what does your spouse say about this decision? I’ve learned over the years, God’s voice sounds a lot like Katie’s in my life. Someone once said, “If you’re married and are one flesh, God might speak to your spouse first about something.”

Pay attention to those you trust and what they say about God’s will in your life.

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Often God will put people in our lives to speak to us and keep us from making poor decisions, but we can miss or discount that. 

What is easy or hard?

This question may not apply to you, but this has been helpful for me. 

I’ve learned over the years that for me, God’s will is usually straightforward, obvious, and more challenging than the other option.

Not always, but often, the easy decision isn’t the path God has called me to. 

Will this get me to where I believe God wants me to be?

I came across this question years ago in Experiencing God. Instead of making a pros & cons list, the author asked, “Will this get me to where I believe God wants me or hinder me?”

Will this get me to where I believe God wants me or hinder me? -Henry Blackaby

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We can easily get paralyzed in decision-making because we might be sure of the first step but not what comes next. So we wait until steps 2 – 5 are clear, but we need to take action and “do the next right thing.”

This gets down to, do I trust that God will show me the next step after I take this one.

Following after God and figuring out his will for our life is about submitting ourselves to him so that we can make the most of our days. 

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Favoritism, Faith and Getting Ahead

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Favorites. 

We all have them. We joke in our families about who is our favorite child or grandchild. So, we know what it’s like to play favorites and how that can hurt relationships. 

And from an early age, we are taught to look for who is the most powerful, prestigious, or wealthiest in any room or situation. We know who people want to be around and learn that our lives can change, often for good, when we get around those people. 

Now, knowing these things in relationships or at work isn’t bad. They can be helpful when you try to accomplish things or need to raise funds for something. 

But the question Jesus poses through various parables and James’s question in chapter 2 is, “Does this knowledge influence how you treat people?” Wrapped up in James 2 is the reality that in the kingdom of God, the rich are brought down, and the poor are brought up. The old saying, “the ground is level at the cross.”

If you’ve been following along at my church as we’ve been going through the book of James and looking at what it means to be the best of you, in chapter 2, we see: The best of you is seen in how you treat people who can’t return the favor.

The best of you is seen in how you treat people who can’t return the favor.

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Going further, the best of you is seen in how you treat people who don’t return the favor.

the best of you is seen in how you treat people who don’t return the favor.

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This is because, throughout Scripture, we are told that God is the father to the fatherless, the defender of the widow (Exodus 22, Deuteronomy 10, Psalm 68).

 If the gospel has changed us, we will not only treat and love people the way God does, but we will see them the way God does. 

Some simple ways this might show up for you are:

  • Sitting with the person who eats alone. 
  • Giving a hug or smile to a person who needs it. 
  • Being fair and honest in your financial dealings. 
  • Not cutting corners, lying, or trying to use people to get ahead at work or financially. 
  • Doing biblical and wise things, not just legal, regarding finances. 
  • Living on less so you can give more. 

The question I ended with on Sunday is one we need to wrestle with: who in your life do you need to love and serve that can’t or won’t return the favor?

Who in your life do you need to love and serve that can’t or won’t return the favor?

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Guardrails, Temptation and Finding Freedom

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We all have things about ourselves that we hate; something we do, things we think, things we feel, and things in our past. We spend a lot of energy trying to change these things. We hope that something will be different tomorrow. Maybe we’ll magically stop looking at porn, buying things we can’t afford or working too much, stop being so desperate for love, stop feeling lonely, and stop saying something at the wrong moment. Perhaps that memory will finally go away.

So, we read our Bibles.

Struggling with sin is the everyday Christian experience. Not because we don’t have power over sin. We do have power because of the work of Jesus on the cross in our place and rising from the dead. We have the ability through the Holy Spirit to battle our sins and win, but we often lose.

What do you do when you keep doing what you hate?

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In Romans 7, we see this struggle in Paul. Tim Keller lays this out as to why this is the present Christian experience:

  • At the beginning of chapter 7, Paul talks in the past tense; in verse 14, he changes to the present tense.
  • In  7 – 13, Paul talks about sin killing him, he’s dead, but in verse 14, Paul begins talking about an ongoing struggle with sin. He is fighting sin, struggling but refuses to surrender.
  • In  18, Paul says, “I know that nothing good dwells in me.” Those who don’t know Jesus are unaware of being lost and sinful. Without Jesus, we think we can save ourselves or are good.
  • In  22, Paul says, “I delight in God’s law.” If you don’t know Jesus, you can’t delight in God’s law.
  • Keller concludes, “Often we repent of past sin and think it’s done, but God wants to show us how to hate it when the seeds come up again.”

To move forward in freedom, it is important to name and confess those things you do that you hate. Those struggles you battle with. To admit what dwells in you. Often we have an inflated view of our goodness, but to experience the grace, we must understand the depths of our brokenness. Otherwise, what do we need God’s grace and forgiveness for?

We must put guardrails into place to find victory over sin and temptation. Guardrails on the road are there to direct and protect. They tell us where to go and where not to go. Guardrails aren’t in the danger zone but are built in the safety zone. One of our problems and reasons we fall into temptation is because we ask, “How far is too far?” Basically, “how close can I get without sinning?” When we have this mindset, we fall into sin.

As you think about finding victory, here are a few questions to answer:

How to hate your sin and run from it.

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What sin, temptation, emotion, situation, or relationship do you need to place a guardrail around? We have to identify what the battle is. Is it food, porn, going into debt, gossip, or working too much? Maybe it is a relationship where you need to have some boundaries to protect your heart or to have some wisdom in the access you give someone. We often fail to identify where a guardrail needs to be placed; if we don’t do that, we won’t protect ourselves.

What does a guardrail look like in that situation? For each person and each case, the guardrail might look different. I have a friend who, to put a guardrail around porn, doesn’t have a smartphone. Some people have cut up their credit cards not to overbuy; maybe they stop going to a place or putting themselves in a situation. Yes, God promises to give us a way out of every temptation, but sometimes, that way is not showing up or opening yourself up to that opportunity. If the thing you are placing a guardrail around involves someone else, let them speak about what the guardrail might be.

What freedom will a guardrail lead to? I think this is a crucial step. What will a life of freedom look like if you place a guardrail around that situation or thing? This focus can be compelling as you work through the complicated steps toward freedom. 

3 questions to help you fight sin and temptation.

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How to Let Go of Shame

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Photo by Sasha Freemind on Unsplash

All of us, to one degree or another, carry around the shame of things we’ve done, something done to us. Things we’ve said, things said to us—things we wished we had done and want to, that others had done. Shame shows up in many places and with all kinds of people.

We often overlook how much shame shapes our identity and lives. It becomes a driving force in our lives, how we work and how we relate to others and God.

Where does shame come from? To move forward in freedom, we must know where the broken places began. 

John Piper says shame comes from three causes:

  1. Guilt. This is the one many of us know well. The addiction, the hidden sin, the abuse we don’t talk about, the affair, the divorce, the poor parenting, our failure at work and in life. We carry guilt for ourselves and, often without thinking, for others. When guilt becomes public knowledge, we have shame. Now we are known for what we have feared.
  2. Shortcomings. Shortcomings and failures are something all of us experience. Some of them are real, and others are imagined. Some are life-shaping, and other shortcomings we shrug off. It is the ones that are life-shaping that lead to shame. When our frame of mind says, “You are a failure, you aren’t good enough, you aren’t beautiful, strong enough, or worthwhile,” we experience shame.
  3. Improprieties. These are the experiences in our life where we feel silly, look stupid, or are embarrassed. We make a mistake, and it feels like everyone knows about it.

These stories, experiences, and parts of our story become so much a part of us that, for many, we can’t imagine living life without them. We are the person this happened to, we are the experience that we walked through. We carry that, and we know that experience, and so often, it is hard to even imagine moving forward without our shame. 

What do you do with your shame?

According to Romans 10:11, if you are a follower of Jesus, you will not be put to shame.

Yet shame is a driving factor in the lives of so many.

Shame is a driving factor in the lives of so many.

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Here are six ways to move forward from your shame:

6 ways to move forward from your shame.

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1. Name your shame. If you don’t name something, it takes ownership of you. This is a crucial step. You must name the hurt, the guilt, the shortcoming, the impropriety, the embarrassment, the abuse, the loss, the misstep, and the sin. If you don’t, you stay stuck.

Whatever you can’t name in your life takes ownership of you.

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I’ve met countless people who couldn’t say the name of an ex, name the situation of hurt or talk about something. This doesn’t mean you are a victim or wallow in your pain, but naming something is crucial. Without this first step, the others become difficult to impossible.

The saying, “Whatever we don’t own, owns us,” applies here. This is a crucial, crucial step.

2. Identify the emotions attached to it. When we are hurt, we are emotionally wrecked and can’t see a way forward. We know that we are broken, and that life isn’t as we’d hoped, but we aren’t sure what to do.

What emotions are attached to your shame? Is it guilt? Loss? Failure? Missed opportunity? Sadness? Hopelessness? Indifference?

Name them.

Name the emotion that goes with your abuse, abandonment, divorce, failed business, dropping out of school, or not meeting your expectations or the expectations of someone else.

We often feel shame when we have a different emotion attached to it, but shame is far more familiar. Do you feel neglected or hurt, or sad? What emotion is conjured up from memory?

3. Confess the sins that are there. Do you always sin when you feel shameful? No. Sometimes it is a misplaced shame. It is a shame you have no business owning. You didn’t sin; someone else sinned against you.

Sometimes, though, there is a sin on your part. You may have sinned, and that’s why you feel shame. Sometimes your sin might be holding on to that person or situation.

Sometimes you must confess that your shame keeps you from moving forward and is keeping you stuck.

Bring those sins to light.

4. Grieve the loss. When we have shame, there is a loss. This loss might be a missed opportunity or missed happiness. It might be more significant than that and be a forgotten childhood, a loss of your 20s, a loss of health, or a job opportunity.

It might be a relationship that will never be, something you can never go back to.

As you think about your shame, what did you lose? What did you miss out on? What did that situation prevent you from doing or experiencing? What hurt do you carry around? What will never be the same because of that situation?

5. Name what you want. This one is new for me, but it concerns your desires.

Often the reason we stay stuck is that we know what stuck is. We don’t know what the future holds. Beyond that, we don’t know what we want.

We carry shame around from a relationship with a father who walked out. Do you want a relationship? Do you want to be in touch?

We carry shame from a failed business. Do you want to get back in the game?

Can you name what you want in the situation associated with your shame?

Sadly, many people cannot.

If you can’t name what you want or identify a desire, you will struggle to move forward.

6. Identify what God wants you to know about Him. When we carry around shame, we carry around a lie. In identifying that lie, we recognize the truth God wants us to know about Him.

If you feel unloved, the truth that God wants you to know is that you are loved. If you feel unwanted, God wants you to know you are wanted. If you feel dirty, God wants you to see the truth that in Him, you are clean.

Scripture tells us that God is a Father, that He is as close to us as a mother nursing her child, and that God is compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in love, gracious, tender, firm, and for us.

The list goes on and on.

In that list, though, is the truth, the antidote to your shame, and what you need to remind yourself of to move forward and live into the freedom of Jesus.

6 ways to move forward from your shame.

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Freedom is hard.

Let’s be honest; freedom is difficult. Living in sin, shame, guilt, and regret is easy. It is what we know. It is where most people live and reside.

Freedom is scary. Freedom is unknown. Freedom leaves us vulnerable. Freedom leaves us not in control.

Yet, this is what it means to be a child of God. To live in freedom. Overflowing freedom.

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How to Make Decisions

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When figuring out God’s will, we often make it incredibly difficult. We talk about it mystically, heightening the sense that only a few find it. We wonder, does God have a specific will for my life? What if I miss it?

Does God have a specific will for your life?

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This happens with marriage; is there the one for me, and what if I marry the wrong one?

If there’s an open door, is that God’s will? Is it God’s way of saying no if it’s a closed door?

We also look at people in the Bible, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and Paul, and see people that God used in incredible ways, spoke to audibly, and laid out his will. We see Noah getting the measurements of the ark. Abraham and Moses are told where to go. Does God still do that?

For us, we have something they didn’t have. God’s will is written out in the form of God’s word. We have God’s inspired, authoritative word. Over 31,000 words that God has given to us and preserved to show us how life is to be lived.

Have you ever noticed that you can often see God’s will for someone else before they can? Others can usually see it for you as well. 

What if you are trying to figure out things in your life and hear the voice of God for you? God speaks to us in a variety of ways. He speaks through his word, opened and closed doors, friends, family, community, our desires and fears, and nature, to name a few. 

As you face your next decision, whether big or small, here are some ways to begin hearing God speak, move in your life, and stop resisting His voice. That last one is a big one.

When making decisions, most people set out the pros and cons of choice and then choose the way with the most pros or the least annoying or uncomfortable cons. What if we thought about it differently? What if we looked at the framework God has given us in Scripture and asked, “Will this choice get me to where God wants me, or will it hinder me?” Sometimes, the choice with the most cons will get us there.

Over the years, a few things have helped me discern what God is doing or calling me to do:

1. Listen to the Bible and close friends you trust who are spiritually mature. God’s will for your life is not a mystery; in fact, it’s all over the pages of the Bible. He tells us how to be married, be friends, and parents, have integrity, honor leaders and government and bosses, pray, fast, worship, and be a good steward of our treasures, time, and talents.

If we do these consistently and wholeheartedly, we will rarely wonder what God’s will for our lives is.

Why?

Because when we listen to his word and wise counsel, we will do what he called us to do, what he designed us to do.

On top of that, ask trusted friends and mentors who you consider to be spiritually mature.

What do they do? How do they live? What do they say about the questions you ask or your struggles?

Listen to them.

Does what they have to say line up with Scripture?

If so, that’s a clue you are heading in the right direction.

Pay attention to what the Bible says to you.

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During this time, you also need to make sure you are taking time to pause, sit and wait and listen. Don’t rush. One of the ways we get into trouble is when we rush ahead and get started too quickly.

2. Live out what the Bible and those friends tell you. 

Here comes the part where many of us get off the ride: Live it out.

It is one thing to say you are going to get up and read your Bible or exercise and another thing to do it.

It’s one thing to say you are going to be more patient with your kids and another thing to show them patience and grace.

Life is filled with regrets, missed opportunities, and a laundry list of should’s and could’s.

Pay attention to wise counsel.

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3. When you feel like God is speaking…act. 

This leads to the last part.

Act.

Do it.

Don’t stand on the sideline.

Have you ever noticed that God is moving in the lives of people who act? I don’t know if he speaks more to them, but they seem to listen more and work more.

Now it is time to move on to what God has said and not look back.

3 ways to hear the voice of God.

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While we’d love for God to give us a full roadmap of our lives, he doesn’t do that. We’d stay put if we knew everything that would come after a decision. That’s why the advice of Dallas Willard is so important: Do the next right thing. Take the next step that you see. 

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How God Grows & Changes Us

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Photo by Hello I’m Nik on Unsplash

All of us in our life and faith journey will walk through trials. If you’re like me, your first response is one of questioning. We question ourselves; we question God, and we get angry at ourselves, others, and God. 

Sunday, I started a brand new series on the book of James. In James, we see how God sees trials, which is incredibly important as we navigate them. James tells us to Consider it a great joy when you encounter trials. 

This is a mind shift for many of us as we view trials as something we should avoid at all costs. James isn’t saying to go searching for trials, but he tells us there is a point to them. He tells us in verse 3: you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its full effect so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.

So, trials build endurance so we can be mature and complete, lacking nothing. When trials come our way, we lack something to which only a trial can bring completeness. 

But how does that happen? Throughout scripture, we see a few different reasons trials happen. In this list, I hope you can begin to see why you are walking through what you’re walking through: 

6 reasons God allows trials.

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Trials test the strength of your faith. It is easy to follow Jesus when life is going well, but what about when life isn’t going according to our plan? Trials demonstrate the strength of our faith.

I often think I deserve blessings and should get good things from God, and as we’ll see later in chapter 1, God gives good gifts. But God also allows trials because trials and gifts are needed to bring us to maturity. 

Trials humble us and show us where we need to depend on God and deepen our trust in God. The more we’re blessed, the more we are tempted to see that we did it. We built our portfolio, marriage, house, career, and body.

When we walk through trials, we may experience feelings of loneliness, which is why many people use the picture of walking through the desert or the dark night of the soul to describe a trial. In these moments, we will find that God is who we cling to, and trials can deepen our dependence and trust in God. 

What loneliness and the dark night of the soul do to our faith.

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Trials show how temporary the things we hold dear are. We get so much confidence from temporary things. Money, stuff, security, medicine, experience, knowledge. We rely on these things to save us instead of God. Trials remind us that these things won’t last.

Trials strengthen our hope for heaven and eternity. The harder the trial, the longer it lasts, and the more we look forward to being with God in eternity. Without trials, we will see the world as not too bad and wonder what makes heaven and the gospel so great.

Trials reveal what we love. Many of our trials will involve a loss: of relationships, careers, finances, house, our health. 

It isn’t wrong to love these things, but trials reveal if they have become an identity piece for us and if we are holding them too tightly. 

Tim Keller said, “You can tell something is an idol in your life by the degree of emotion you feel when something blocks it.” All of us have idols. Idols are anything or anyone we look to do what only God can do. Only God can complete us, not a job, child, or marriage. Only God can fulfill us, not a dream, goal, or career. Only God is our refuge, not our home. Only God is our security, not our money and stuff.

Trials have a way of revealing what our idols and identity are. 

You can tell something is an idol in your life by the degree of emotion you feel when something blocks it. -Tim Keller

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Trials can strengthen us for greater usefulness. This is what James is getting at; trials build endurance. For future things: maturity, completeness, wholeness, perfection, lacking nothing. 

Throughout Scripture and church history, God uses trials in the lives of people who impact our world. 

Trials also help us help others. Walking through things in this world gives us an opportunity to walk with others as they experience trials. 

The point of trials and difficulties in our lives.

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