Good Friday.

Good Friday.

The day of Our Lord’s suffering, passion, and death.

There are not words enough to do justice to the pain and suffering and glory of this day.

Barabbas was chosen to be released over Christ.

This choice was so that the Lord’s will would be carried out.

And the passion of Christ begins.

Christ was chained to a post and scourged.

His body brutally beaten with cruel weapons.

Weapons that sliced His sacred skin.

Weapons that when thrown upon His body took a hold of His flesh

and ripped it off of His body.

And He went through this because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

A crown of thorns was placed upon His head.

Actually, people believe that it was more of a cap of thorns.

The 2 inch thorns were forced into the sacred head of Our Lord.

Blood ran down His face joining with the rest of the blood that covered His body.

And He tolerated this all because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

Jesus carried the cross to Golgotha.

The heavy physical burden.

The wood rubbing against Christ’s skin, irritating it even more.

The dirty wood shoving splinters through Christ’s bloody ripped skin.

He falls on the gravel three times.

The gravel pushing up through the gaping wounds all over His body.

The burden of the cross falling down with our blessed Lord.

He carried His cross all because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

When Jesus reached the place called Skull,
He was rudely placed upon the cross.

Nails that are thought to have been 7-9 inches long were hammered to Jesus’ feet and His hands,
just below the wrist.

A block of wood was fastened to the cross under Christ’s feet which left His knees slightly bent.

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

The nails driven through His hand and wrist area did not break a bone
but they are thought to have hit a major nerve that controlled movement
and feeling of the shoulders.

Because of the strain on the nerve,
Jesus lacked the ability to lift up His head to breathe.

To be able to breathe,
Christ had to put force on His feet that were nailed onto the block of wood
so that He could force the rest of His body up to breathe.

He went through this pain because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

The soldiers mocked Jesus and made fun of Him.

They told Him that He should save Himself.

And He could have.

He is God.

He can do anything.

But He chose to stay on the cross.

Obedience brought Him to the cross

It was love that kept Him there.

His love for YOU.

Love kept Him on the cross.

Staying on the cross showed extreme humility.

His love brought about humility.

He humbled Himself to death, even death on a cross because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

Jesus was crucified between two criminals.

One on His right.

One on His left.

One criminal joined in with the soldiers in mocking Jesus.

The other one repented of His sins and asked for Christ’s forgiveness.

Confession.

Right there.

On the Cross.

“Amen, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

He instituted the sacrament of confession and is gracious enough to forgive us of our sin because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

Mary standing at the foot of the cross.

Her pain inexpressible.

Her motherly desire to reach out and help her son was a desire like no other.

But She could do nothing.

It was in this moment that Her fiat was required to be a silent one.

Her yes had to be quiet.

She could only pray.

And then listen to Her son when He said,

“Woman, behold your son.”

He would not leave His mother alone.

He will not leave us alone simply because

HE.

LOVES.

YOU.

At about 3 o’clock,

The hour of mercy, in Jesus’ great pain and agony,

He cried out to His father,

“My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”

Jesus then proceeded knowing that His time was almost finished and said,

“I thirst.”

He was given some wine on a sprig of hyssop.

This completed the fourth cup of the Passover from the night before and Jesus said,

“It is finished.”

Thus, that line has many meanings.

The Passover was now finished.

Christ’s time on earth was almost finished.

The suffering on the cross was almost finished.

Jesus cried out in a loud voice,

“Father into Your hands I commend My spirit.”

Jesus bowed His head and died.

The earth quaked and people came to believe.

“Truly this was the Son of God!”

“This man was innocent beyond doubt.”

This man was innocent.

Yet He was obedient to the point of death on a cross so that we might live.

Truly He loved us.

Truly He loves us.

And truly He always will.

He gave His life for us.

The least we can do is live our lives for Him because 

HE. 

LOVES.

YOU.

Psalm 51:12. Wednesday, March 9. 2016.

The “honeymoon phase” of relationships is so fun and so easy.

All the good feelings and emotions take precedence over any negative at all. 

But the reality is, that phase ends.

The good feelings and emotions neutralize,

we come back down to earth,

and reality sets in.

Sometimes the truth is,

the outline above describes our relationship with Christ.

We are so in love!

We can’t imagine life without Christ!

We won’t ever sin again!

Prayer is something we just can’t get enough of!

We can’t find enough ministries to belong to!

We can’t get through the Bible fast enough!

The Rosary seems like the best time of our day!

And, and, and.

And then

the “honeymoon phase” ends.

For whatever reason.

Reality.

Life.

Circumstances.

Emotions fade.

Feelings wane.

Time gets the best of us.

This is reality, unfortunately.

We go through these dry spells.

These times of questioning.

Of being captivated by the world.

The prayer that we once held so dear

is now a well run dry.

We might consider this shameful or embarrassing

but the thing is,

we are not alone in this.

See, the psalmist, David, felt these feelings too.

Thousands of year ago.

He wrote a Psalm about it.

Psalm 51.

“A clean heart create for me, God;

renew within me a steadfast spirit.”

Psalms 51:12

And thousands of year after David first expressed these feelings,

a modern Christian artist expressed the same feelings.

Jon Foreman wrote a song called White as Snow in which he sings:

“Would You create in me a clean heart, oh God.

Restore in me the joy of Your salvation.”

Both men crying out for forgiveness.

Asking if the Lord could possibly forgive their wandering,

their faulty choices,

their flighty emotions,

and make their hearts clean, once again.

Not only did they ask for a clean heart,

but they also asked that the Lord give them a reason to be joyful again.

A way to possibly extend that “honeymoon phase”.

Interestingly enough,

that requested joy had nothing to do with the things of the world.

Quite the opposite.

Lord, let us find joy in your salvation.

These men, realized that there was not joy to be found in the things of the world.

The true joy was to be found in salvation.

In the opportunity of eternal life with Christ

because He took on death so that we didn’t have to.

Brothers and sisters, you see, there is always joy to be found.

Even in the dark, dull moments of our faith.

Even in the doubt and questioning.

Even when our emotions decide to take off in another direction.

It isn’t necessarily easy to find that joy.

Maybe we aren’t really sure how to.

But we might be able to take some advice from some incredible Christians and simply pray:

“Would You create in me a clean heart, oh God.

Restore in me the joy of Your salvation.”

Rich. Monday, October 19. 2015.

Then he told them a parable. “There was a rich man whose land produced a bountiful harvest. He asked himself, ‘What shall I do, for I do not have space to store my harvest?’

And he said, ‘This is what I shall do: I shall tear down my barns and build larger ones. There I shall store all my grain and other goods and I shall say to myself, “Now as for you, you have so many good things stored up for many years, rest, eat, drink, be merry!”’ But God said to him, ‘You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?’ Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God.”

Luke 12: 16-21

This Gospel reading from today was a somber reminder.

Of a couple of things.

In this parable,

God reminds the rich man that he is mortal.

He will die.

And in this case,

very soon.

We all know that we are mortal beings.

But sometimes life sweeps us up

and we forget that death is inevitable.

We like to think we are invincible.

The idea of death is a scary one,

so we put it on the back burner

and we go go go on with our lives.

And unfortunately,

all too often,

the way in which we go go go,

is much like the way of the rich man.

We live in a world where most of us have to work.

We need food.

We need clothes.

And we need money for those things.

And as a result,

we work our lives away.

Money and materials become our livelihood.

We are oh so rich in the world.

In things of this world.

And we are oh so poor in what is rich to Christ.

“You’re going to die tonight

and all that you’ve worked for won’t matter anymore.”

How blunt!

What a wakeup call.

What a reminder that working our lives away on the worldly things

is basically in vain.

We need to work on our souls.

We need to work on our hearts.

We need to work on our relationship with Christ.

Strengthen our weak points.

Seek healing for our souls.

Learn to love.

Seek Christ.

Put our stock in things not of this world.

It is there that our work will never be in vain.

Being rich in what matters to the Lord is a journey.

A lifelong one.

One that we may fail at.

Even multiple times a day.

But a worthwhile journey.

One that will bring us closer to the heart of Christ.

Let us strive to be rich in what matters to God.

And to intentionally not be rich in what matters to the world.

To be rich in the Lord means to not have to worry about the things of this life.

Because they are in His hands.

In His control.

If we are rich in Him,

it does not matter who the world says we are.

Because our identity is found in Him.

If we are rich in Him,

we will trust that He will provide for our needs, whatever they may be.

If we are rich in Him,

we will live for Him

and we will die for Him.

Lord, help us to be rich in You. 

Trust. Saturday, August 29. 2015.

This summer I spent a lot of time worrying.

And obviously, not blogging.

Apparently anxiety and worry are good time-consumers.

Right at the beginning of summer,

I resigned from my job.

A job that I enjoyed.

A place where, ideally, I would have stayed.

But I knew the Lord was speaking, calling.

And I had to go.

My decision surprised some people.

Myself included.

But when the Father calls,

we go.

I cannot pray,

“Your will be done”

or

“I am Yours, do with me as You will”

and look in the other direction or ignore the call when it comes.

However,

just because I go,

does not mean that I have an abundance of grace as I go.

Quite the opposite.

The spirit is willing.

But the flesh?

Weak sauce, man.

I resigned.

And I went.

But not to anywhere in particular.

Honestly,

I felt like such a fool when my coworkers and school parents ask where I was headed.

Did I have another job lined up?

No…

Was I going back to school?

No…

Was I taking time to travel?

No…

Okay…well…best of luck?

Yup.

Yeah.

Thanks.

Thanks so much.

Thank you for reiterating the fact that I have

NO IDEA WHAT I’M DOING.

Thus,

spending my summer worrying.

No job lined up.

No leads.

No real idea.

False leads.

Unrealistic ideas.

And so went my summer.

All of June.

All of July.

Part of August.

Half of me trying to relish in these free days

and

the other half kicking myself for walking away from a good job.

Anxiety.

Worry.

Anger.

There was a long period of intense anger.

Anger towards God.

Pent-up, pressure cooker anger status.

And only after much prayer was that anger released.

One may find that in letting go,

God is able to work.

Two job interviews lined up within 24 hours of praying.

Both incredible opportunities.

And so the story goes.

I have a new job.

An incredible one.

One that I have dreamed about for ages.

But,

I’m a little bit bummed.

This lesson of trusting Jesus was a lot harder than it should have been.

At times it hurt.

I doubted.

I was anxious.

I was worried.

Nervous.

Angry.

Tried to trust.

Fake trusted.

I essentially had to hit rock-bottom emotionally and maybe even spiritually

in order to see that this was basically a real-life trust fall.

Me trusting the Lord.

Me trusting in His plan.

Me letting go.

Me not being worried about money or all the time that was sliding by.

Me not caring what others thought or said.

Me knowing that He is good and He cares for me.

Me believing that His most perfect will was being carried out.

Me just simply trusting Him.

I could look at this summer as a screw up on my part.

Or I could see it as a practice test along the way

and pray that I do better next time.

And I can certainly praise God that He continues to make and mold and stretch us to our limits,

in order for us to best be able to love Him.

And I can praise Him for His faithfulness in my fury and fear.

And I can pray that next time I have the conviction to say from the beginning,

Jesus, I trust in you!

Live Intentionally. Monday, July 13. 2015.

I’m an athlete.

This statement has become real to me since I haven't been able to run.

I’ve been injured since mid-May.

This means that my running 50 miles a week dwindled to nothing.

Now, it’s back on the rise…8 miles last week! Woohoo!

But as I’m writing this,

I have yet another new pain in my foot.

During this time of no running

and the school year coming to an end,

I’ve had a lot of free time.

A lot.

Free time that I planned on using as running time.

But I can’t run.

And I still have this free time.

Athletes are adrenaline junkies.

It’s our addiction.

Our drug of choice.

I don’t do well with so much free time.

No new goal or new height or new distance or new pace.

I feel so blah.

Like I am just going through the motions.

No purpose.

Day in and day out.

Focusing on the things ahead

and not paying attention to all that is in between.

Only to find that the thing I was looking towards isn’t nearly as great as I had hoped.

Along with that disappointment,

is the loss of all the sacred time from here

to the not-so-great thing looked forward to.

Intent.

It’s a word that has been on my heart lately.

Intend.

Intention.

Intentionally.

I get the feeling that I am supposed to apply these words to my life right now.

But I am still learning how exactly to do that.

My current goal is to

live with intention.

Live intentionally.

Be intentional.

I don’t know exactly what those phrases mean yet,

but I am learning.

I think our lives are too precious to be wasted.

We are meant for more than

drowning in an ice-cream-pint-pity-party

or getting our Netflix-fix.

Our lives have meaning.

They have a purpose.

It is up to us to seek out that purpose.

To find the reason.  

I haven’t been doing this ‘living with intent’ thing for long.

I’ve spent most of my time being injured dwelling on the negative.

It’s only been recently that I have tried to change my mindset

but even still, I screw it up multiple times a day.

Today for example.

I’ve failed so much more than I will even begin to admit.

I’m not a pro,

but I’m trying.

I certainly know that there is a difference between sitting on the couch all day

or going out and making the most of the day I’ve been blessed with.

I’m learning that there is a difference between doing something

and doing that something with grace.

I’m figuring out that attitude accounts for much of how we go about our days.   

I’m curious to know how the world would change if we all lived with intent.

I intend to live.

I intend to live well.

I choose to live intentionally.

I trust that though life is hard,

we have a God who intends to see us through,

even in the darkest of times. 

Leadership 101. Wednesday, June 10. 2015.

“Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does He give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does He give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does He give them opportunities to love each other?”

Morgan Freeman as God in Evan Almighty

Often, things don’t come in the pretty little packages that we imagine they would.

Patience doesn’t come in the form of patience

but rather,

the opportunities to be patient.

Courage doesn’t come in the form of courage,

but rather,

the opportunities to be courageous.

Love doesn’t come in the form of love,

but rather,

the opportunities to show love.

Leadership doesn’t come in the form of leading,

but rather,

the opportunities to be a servant.

We often think that leadership says,

“I am above you.

You are below me.

Do as I say.

And by the way,

you’re doing everything wrong”.

We lead with our egos.

This hurts people.

It puts people in crappy positions.

And they have to make decisions that they don’t want to make.

And then we aren’t raising effective leaders.

We put people down when our egos are inflamed.

Ego engulfs us

and leaves no room for others.

Ego extinguishes others’ spirits.

I’m not the best leader

but I do know the most important part of leadership.

Service.

That there is Leadership 101.

You just need one word.

Service.

Don’t worry about the leading.

Just serve.

The leading will fall into place.

True leadership asks,

“How can I help you?

How can I ensure that you are being the best you?

Where can I serve alongside you?

What are your goals, dreams, and aspirations?

How can we get there?

What can I do to be a better leader?”

Leading through service elevates the lives of others.

There is no ego.

Just a servant’s heart.

A heart humble enough to let others’ spirits grow.

A heart wise enough to know that,

just because someone else's spirit is illuminated,

does not take away the light from your spirit.  

My friend Steve Schultz put it this way:

Lead. Love. Elevate.

Brilliant.

Succinct.

Spot-on.

“The world needs good leaders.”

Many people have said this.

Most recently,

I heard this from someone who is far from a good leader.

I wanted to scoff.

Actually,

I think I did.

And then I gossiped about it later on,

when I should have taken it as an opportunity.

An opportunity to be a good leader.

I missed it.

But there’s tomorrow.

And the next day.

And the day after that.

His mercies are new each morning.

His graces abound each sunrise.

So too should ours.

Let us lead as Jesus did.

Through love.

Lead. Love. Elevate.