Howling Like Hell

The wind here in the mountains has been fiercely blowing since late yesterday evening. After a nearly perfect spring day on Palm Sunday, the wind picked up and hasn’t stopped since. The huge trunks of the great oak in the back are even moving (which they rarely do). And while our house was built to withstand such winds, it’s been creaking and even shuddering at times from the gusts and billows. “Howling like Hell” is a perfect description for the weather this morning, which brings me to this entry.

In a recent interview with Pope Francis (early 2024), he said that he hoped that Hell would be empty. On the surface, that sounds great — but it misses the real point of Hell on so many levels. A few were quick to respond, with one of the better rebuttals coming from Dennis Prager, a reformed Jew who said that he hoped for the opposite: that some people would go to Hell (i.e., that it would indeed not be empty, or at least not completely). He went on to say why, both in his weekly column and in a Fireside Chat that followed (https://dennisprager.com/column/the-pope-hopes-no-one-is-in-hell-we-should).

So how can someone counter another who wants no one to go to Hell? Because without Hell (or at least some form of punishment in the afterlife), God would not be just. And if God is not just, then He’s not a god worth following (paraphrased). And those are soberingly true statements. Those who wish for Hell to be empty are awfully close (theologically) to those who would deny the very existence of Hell.

Nearly ten years ago in a Washington Post interview, Ben Carson surprised many people by saying he doesn’t believe in a literal hell, because he contends that a loving God would never torment anyone in Hell, especially for eternity (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2015/12/01/why-ben-carson-doesnt-believe-in-hell/). As a member of the Seventh Day Adventist church, this is one of several significant differences between that belief system and mainstream/orthodox Christianity. However, this is a common hindrance to faith in God that many cite when they ask: “How can a loving God allow pointless suffering?” or “How can a loving God send someone to Hell?”

Such questions are the type in which the people asking them don’t necessarily want answers as much as stating ( in the form of a question) why they’re refusing to believe in God. Whether they realize it or not (let’s assume “not”), they’re impugning God’s character and several of His primary traits: that He is holy, that He is just, and that He is loving. With one simple rhetorical question much like that which was first asked in the Garden of Eden (“Did God really say…?”), the faith of many has been hampered or destroyed and the character of God called into question.

The issue is trifold much like the Trinity (Three in One): that God is perfectly just while being perfectly holy AND perfectly loving. He cannot and does not violate His nature, and therefore the resolution of the conflicts between those three traits can sometimes seem odd to us, or at least unintuitive. Though He loves fiercely,  He cannot tolerate evil or sin and His very being demands justice — and not just for those wronged or harmed when injustice occurs — but for His own Self.

A real-world example of His nature is to consider the sun: the sun provides incredible light, power, and unfathomable heat, but they are inseparable; you cannot have one without the others. The sun is completely intolerant of anything cooler than itself and vaporizes anything that approaches it — unless it’s wrapped in some form of heat-shield capable of protecting it from the sun’s unforgiving fury!

Such it is with God and His holiness, love, and justice; He cannot tolerate sin and evil in any form unless it’s somehow shielded or protected from Him. His very nature demands justice, yet He is also incredibly merciful and loving. The only way we sinful creatures are protected from His holy nature is by wrapping ourselves in the righteousness of Jesus, the one and only Mediator that God has provided for us to draw near to Him — and for Him to draw near to us. God is committed to making us holy, to burning away all the sin and evil from our hearts so we can dwell with Him in Heaven.

Since God created everything and will fill all Creation with Himself and His love and holiness (and those who are conformed to Himself), what is He to do with those who refuse His love? What is He to do with those who refuse to wrap themselves in the blood of Christ, our “sin-shield”? They must either be annihilated or be cast completely out of the entire Creation — into the Outer Darkness. And annihilation isn’t really an option for God because He has created us in His image: as eternal beings.

Ironically, the Person who spoke the most about the reality of Hell was Jesus Christ Himself. Before He began teaching on the reality of Hell and its torment, Sheol (or the Pit) was where souls went after people died — usually described as into the bowels of earth. It was Jesus — God the Son in the Flesh — Who revealed what Hell was all about, and He should know because He created it (Colossians 1:16-17)!

In the beginning, God never intended to send people to Hell because it was a place created specifically for Satan and his angels (Matthew 25:41). It wasn’t until we sinned that Hell (or the Outer Darkness) was a possible destination for human beings. Not only that, but because we had chosen Sin and Death over Life (ie, from Him), Hell became our default destination after we die. Again, if God has made everything and people choose not to be with Him by accepting His salvation, then what is He to do with them? He has to send them outside of His Creation — into the Outer Darkness.

The horrible reality of Hell and the tragic majority of the population of people who will be going there some day is also foretold by Jesus in Matthew 7:13-14 where He says:

“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”

While Jesus likely has the same desire as Pope Francis (that few will be sent to Hell), from this passage it seems to be that He knows that this will not be the case. That’s why He came into the world in the first place: to offer salvation through His blood/sacrifice so that no one would have to go to Hell. However, many (or most) will remain on the broad road to destruction (Hell) and very few will actually find the way to life and be saved (ie, through Him).

We can assume that everyone wants to go to Heaven after they die, but how many people would actually want to go there to be with God and Jesus as they’re described in the Bible? My personal belief is very few indeed; if people really want to have a relationship with God and Jesus, wouldn’t they be pursuing it in this life, while they actually have a choice? If you don’t care about God in this life, why would you want to spend eternity with Him in the next?

Another insight into holiness relates to the subject of suffering. Why does God allow so much suffering in this world? He certainly has the power to do something about it, but all too often He doesn’t. He allows it or even instigates it in some circumstances, particularly in His command to take the Gospel to the ends of the earth and make disciples of every tongue, tribe, and nation.

Were there mass-slaughters in Africa before a few decades ago when the Gospel really began to penetrate the so-called Dark Continent? Yes, but nowhere near on the scale they have been recently. This has been the history of Christianity from the beginning: wherever the Gospel goes and begins to invade a culture, contention, strife, and upheavals follow because Satan and his demons oppose it. They’re not willing to surrender a single inch and will do whatever they can to oppose the Gospel from bringing others to Christ. Jesus gave His message to twelve men who eventually overturned one of the greatest empires in the history of the world, even though it cost them and many others their very lives.

A last insight into God’s holiness is its locale with regards to the earth. Most people speak of going to this wonderful place called Heaven after they die and dwell there forever, but that’s not the picture of the afterlife that the Bible paints. According to the New Testament, people who are saved go to be with Jesus, who currently dwells in Heaven. However, sooner or later, He promises to return to the earth and bring all of His people with Him. Not only that, but after His 1,000-year reign on this earth, the current heavens and earth will vanish away and new ones are created and New Jerusalem (or Heaven) descends to the earth and remains there for Eternity (Revelation 19-22).

The overarching theme of the Bible is of God dwelling with us. He reaches down and invades our culture, our world with His influence, His Word, and sometimes even His presence. It is HE who’s taking action and making things happen — not us. Yet He has a problem. A BIG problem. He is blindingly holy and just but we are appallingly unholy and unjust. So He invades us and replaces our unholy hearts with His Holy one and sets out to remake us from in the inside out. His plan is to make the world holy again not merely imposing His Will upon it, but by filling it with people who have been made holy.

While Pope Francis may have had the best of intentions when he said that he hoped that Hell will be empty, I believe it would have been much better for him to say that Hell will be full, that it is humanity’s default destination because of our sin, and that he wishes that everyone would come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ by turning to Him in faith, in repentance, and seeking His forgiveness and therefore be saved.

Virtual Voice by Amazon KDP

In early November 2023, Amazon’s Kindle Digital Publishing (KDP) surprised the publishing industry by announcing that a beta program for creating audiobooks from eBooks was in the works called “Virtual Voice”. The new service would use AI (Artificial Intelligence) to “read” your KDP eBooks and quickly generate audiobooks which would then be published to Amazon’s Audible store. Left unsaid was that Amazon/KDP would have some sort of exclusivity program to list books produced by their services only in their stores and no other channels.

As with other initiatives from Amazon, their Virtual Voice program announcement has had a mixed reception, with opinions ranging from “revolutionary and game-changing” to “its-the-end-of-the-publishing-world” extremes. There’s no disputing that Amazon has had a huge impact on every part of the book industry, from retailers to publishers to readers. Since Amazon began selling books online in 1995, many bookstores and publishers have been put out of business (or have significantly scaled back their services). Meanwhile, since 2007 when KDP began, many authors who would’ve likely never been published can quickly and easily publish their own books in a variety of forms from eBooks to paperback to hardcovers. And what does it cost to publish with KDP? $0.00 per book.

For myself, the announcement of Virtual Voice couldn’t have come at a better time, as I was looking to publish several more audiobooks in 2024. Ideally I would publish all my books as audiobooks, but that would be a big undertaking. Two years ago, I used FindAway Voices to publish two audiobooks (“The Author of Life” and “The Seed of Haman”), though the process was cumbersome and expensive. Even with the royalty-sharing program in which the expenses are split between the author and narrator, the cost per book was at least $450 — and more if your book is longer. And that doesn’t include the time spent on producing audiobooks that could be better used elsewhere — like writing more books.

To traditionally produce an audiobook, you first have to find a narrator whose voice fits with your manuscript, interview them, hope they’ll want to narrate your book, and then contract their services. Depending on their schedule, you might get the audiobook proofs back for review within a few weeks up to several months. After receiving the proofs, you need to manually review the audio content, send back the corrections, wait for those to be re-produced, then finally approve the finished audio content when everything is correct. At minimum, in my experience this process will take at least 1-2 months. You can narrate and produce your own audiobooks, but then you would need to buy the equipment, record your material, and then find the time to professionally produce the material.

While the traditional audiobook process may be acceptable for one or two books (not to mention affordable), it isn’t for many more. In my case, I have over thirty books in my library — and more on the way. I simply can’t afford the overhead nor the time to produce more than a few audiobooks a year — at least not traditionally. As with my previous self-publishing experience, the new KDP program came along just in time, so my plans to publish more audiobooks was put on hold until Virtual Voice was ready.

By mid-December, I received the invitation to join the Virtual Voice beta and I dove in headfirst, with plans to generate as many audiobooks from my existing materials as possible. I was a bit skeptical at first, so I started with some of the smaller books and put it to the test. After playing around with their Virtual Voice Studio editor a bit and listening to the AI narrators/voices, it didn’t take long to publish the first audiobook and then I was off and running. At the start of the beta, there were four voices to choose from but now there are eight. And the cost for publishing an audiobook with KDP’s new Virtual Voice service? $0.00!

On the first day of the beta (after about 2-3 hours), I had fifteen audiobooks published and on their way to the Audible store. After resolving several issues with KDP, by mid-January all my eBooks had been published as audiobooks (33 in all). The main issues I encountered were how KDP processes the eBook’s Table of Contents, along with a quirk that was likely unique to one of my books. The bug was with a book I had written about the Bible character Job (pronounced like “robe” not “rob”). The KDP editor kept erroring when trying to replace the pronunciation, likely because it occurred over 1,000 times in the book. KDP ended up having to fix the code on their side to resolve the issue.

I found the quality of the AI narrators to be acceptable though not perfect, and it’s certainly better than Siri’s or Google’s voice used in their Maps mobile app. I expect the quality to improve over time as the technology matures and more authors use the Virtual Voice service. Machine Learning “learns” and improves as more data (and a variety of data) is added, and I would expect that Amazon/KDP will continue improving the voices and the narration over the upcoming months/years. Also, I would expect that other languages will soon be supported too.

While the AI narrators in Virtual Voice did sound a bit “artificial” at times, in my case the tradeoffs and benefits were certainly worth it. For myself, I’d rather have my books reach a larger audience at a low publishing cost immediately rather than wait several months or years (if at all). Also, with a niche readership, it doesn’t make sense to spend hundreds of dollars per book and never recoup the production costs. If I decide to traditionally publish another audiobook, I can always de-list it from KDP and then re-distribute the new version made through another service.

All in all, I’ve had a great experience with KDP’s Virtual Voice program and am looking forward to seeing how it grows and evolves as more authors join it.

For a more in-depth analysis on Virtual Voice and its potential impact on the audiobook world, I found this article most helpful:

Amazon’s Virtual Voice poised to change Audiobook Industry

The Space Between

I’ve been spending the week here in Cape Canaveral, where it’s been a healthy mix of sun and rain (though the high humidity is constant!). My brother is visiting on a working vacation, and it’s been nice showing him around and getting a little work done here. He takes long walks in the morning and has probably seen more of the town than I have!

Before my trip, my wife asked me to find her some sand dollars while I was here, but after a couple of days scouring the beach, I only managed to find her a couple of broken ones. The best sand dollars (or at least the complete ones!) are usually found on the west side of the state on the gulf beaches, particularly Sanibel Island.

She’s asked me before why I like to come here, and I wasn’t able to give her a very good answer, at least not when she first asked. It was a good question, and therefore it deserves a good answer. It’s a dichotomy of sorts: I like to visit and spend time here and think of it often, yet not put down roots when I’ve had the opportunity to do so. I’ve been to many areas in Florida and along the coast, but this tends to be the place I gravitate back to.

The community of Cape Canaveral / Cocoa Beach is an interesting mix of sun, sand, space, snowbirds, tourists, retirees, and regular working people building their families and lives here. While most are nice, the beaches and homes and town aren’t the busiest, the richest, or the flashiest when compared to Miami, Tampa, and other hotspots on the coast. Surfing and other water sports are big here, even though the waves aren’t the biggest or most powerful, at least not like Hawaii or the West Coast. There are seashells, starfish, and other sea-treasures to be found, but not like on the gulf side or in the Bahamas. The people are usually friendly and laid back, enjoying the beach-life and the slower pace. 

As I’ve had some time to really think about my wife’s question (while on the beach, of course!), I was able to come up with some answers. At first, they ranged from the familiarity of the place to the beaches, the surfing culture, the weather, the nearby port filled with huge cruise ships, the beach bars and restaurants, and every tourist-trap in between. Not only that, but with SpaceX and NASA, the Space Coast is booming (literally!) with frequent rocket launches and a revitalized space industry. The sunrises are often breathtaking, and then at the end of the day you can walk down the street to the Banana River and see equally stunning sunsets.

However, the main reason I like this area is because on some level, it feels like home — even though I know it’s not nor is it intended to be (at least for me). This was the first place I moved to after graduating from high school and where I started out on my own. It’s where I’ve always been drawn to yet know I’m not meant to stay for long. Also (and most importantly to me), it’s where I started my walk, my journey with God thanks to a good church with great people over in Merritt Island. For those reasons, I always feel closer to God, His creation, and even people when I’m here.

However, even though this place feels so familiar after so many years coming here that it almost feels like home, I know that it’s not nor was it ever meant to be. For me, this is a place of peace and perspective — a place to pray, contemplate, and find direction again. A place to take a little break from normal life that’s more than just a typical vacation spot or getaway.

Over the last three decades since my first time here, I’ve found that a place loses its specialness once the familiarity sets in, for good or bad, and I’ve always been well aware of that happening here. Everyone needs their own “thinking spot”, and I suppose this is mine. When I’m here, I rarely miss a chance to see a sunrise, and I often get up extra early to make sure I see the best colors. I began writing my first book here more than thirty years ago, and it’s still one that’s dear to my heart (even though it never did well). Maybe I’ll even re-write it someday — again!

One time several years ago when I came back for a visit, the city of Cape Canaveral had begun promoting a new motto, “The Space Between”, meaning that it’s the “space between sea and sky.” That seemed a little odd to me, especially at first. But as I thought more about it, that’s been my experience here to a certain extent: a space between.

In different ways, this is my personal “Space Between”… the space between different phases of my life, of the ending of old things and the beginning of new ones. I came here when first starting out after leaving home, after graduating from college, after my divorce, and when life seemed to have gone sideways yet again. And this most recent visit is another entry in my story here, one I could share with my brother.

God is good, and He knows what we need better than we ourselves often do. He creates beautiful things and places that can reach us and speak to us like no others can. For some, that means the desert, the mountains, a countryside, the beach, small quaint towns, or even bustling cities.

For myself, that place seems to be here — in this Space Between.

The Second Half

A few years ago, my men’s group from church did a great study about “The Second Half” by Patrick Morley. The focus of the book is to help men understand the different phases of their lives, how to navigate through the mid-life phase, and then how to build the “second half” of their lives. Though both men and women experience the mid-life phase, men experience it differently because much of their identity is defined by their work or career rather than their children.

Generally speaking, our adult lives are divided into two parts, a first half and a second. The first half (starting roughly after graduating from high school) encompasses college and early career, finding a partner, and often building a family. The second half begins soon after the children begin their first halves, either by leaving for college or moving out of the house. When the “empty nest” sets in, people often find themselves restless, purposeless, bored, or even depressed.

Often during this time of the ending of the first half or the beginning of the second half is when “mid-life crises” occur, when extra-marital affairs take place, long-standing life habits and routines suddenly change, or people pursue a change in careers. During midlife, people often try to change their lifestyle, their appearance, moving elsewhere, getting a divorce, buying a new home or car, changing their tastes, and all sorts of other things to try to fill that sudden void or listlessness that they’re now feeling.

It’s also during this time of mid-life when chemical, physical, or biological changes are occurring, such as menopause, our metabolism slowing down, our strength and stamina decreasing, and odd aches and pains that crop up. However, those changes aren’t the primary cause for such mid-life crises as much as a confusion in identity: how that person sees themselves and even realizing that they’re not who they want to be. It’s in this mid-life stage that many people wake up one morning and question what they’ve really done with their lives and wonder who they are.

Over the last year, my wife and I have been preparing for the “second half” of our lives together, though we didn’t really consciously set out to. A year and a half ago, I found myself back in Cape Canaveral, Florida, where I had lived thirty years earlier starting a new life after leaving home. While I was there (both times), I had no clue as to what the future had in store, often not really even knowing where I’d be living beyond a month or two. Six months later, I was in Michigan for a few months helping my parents after my dad had open-heart surgery, and then soon after that my wife and I were back together. It was a rough year, to say the least.

Now we’re in the process of moving to a different home in a different state with a different climate than we’re both used to. Our kids are all graduated and well on their way with their own lives. The conflict and tension that had hung over us and our marriage has ended, and the last year has been one of rest and rebuilding together. For both of us, it’s the start of our second half. We’re both rather surprised at where this journey in life has taken us.

While I was out for a long walk this morning listening to an audio-book on the Holy Land, it struck me that our spiritual lives generally follow the same pattern/sequence as the ancient Israelites. In their history, they went from infancy to bondage (in Egypt) and were then liberated by God to go to the Promised Land, but along the way, they had to first sojourn in the wilderness where they would be tested. They had expected to enter the Promised Land in a matter of weeks, but because of their faithlessness, complaining, and rebellion, their journey that could have taken less than forty days turned into one that lasted forty years!

In our own journey (spiritually speaking), we go from infancy/youth to bondage (sin), and then from bondage to liberation when God brings us into His family and sets our sights on the Promised Land (Heaven). However, before we can go there, He places us in the wilderness of this world, where we are to sojourn and undergo our time of testing, refinement, and even wandering until He calls us Home.

“By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” — Hebrews 11:8-10

Like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and our other spiritual patriarchs, we are called to be strangers in a strange land and sojourners, all the while spreading our faith and knowledge of Him to those we encounter along the way.

Introducing… Audiobooks!

Now available everywhere audiobooks are sold!

With the growing popularity of audiobooks, I recently decided to wade into those waters and had “The Author of Life” made into an audiobook by the great people at Findaway Voices!

After researching several options for how to create and publish audiobooks, I decided to use Findaway’s “Voices Share” program, which halves the production costs of the audiobook for which the narrator(s) are compensated by receiving half the audiobook royalties, though the author has the option to “buy them out” later. As with all forms of publishing, authors’ rights are critical when choosing a publisher, and Findaway presented the best options for authors, narrators, and other content-creators (in my opinion!). Being able to control pricing, content/changes, discounts, and distribution also played into the decision, as Audible/ACX has a policy of exclusivity for the audiobooks they publish. Also, Findaway’s recent distribution agreement with Spotify made the choice all that much easier!

“The Author of Life” audiobook is available at ChirpBooks, Spotify, Audible, and most other retailers.

The synopsis is:

When you think about God, what’s the first image that pops into your mind? Even when you hear the word “God”, what feelings arise? Are those thoughts and feelings of a loving, forgiving Father or a harsh, distant Judge or Someone in between two – or perhaps even something else entirely?

Could it be that because of our preconceptions, culture, and own personal history, the very word “God” itself colors our views and perceptions of Him at a fundamental level? What if our biases have actually blinded us to Him, His Word, and His heart?

What if we were able to reset those preconceptions and free ourselves from the baggage of our biases, perceptions, and our past experiences with God and those who claim to know Him?

What if we could start over from the beginning and learn about God without all our preconceived notions getting in the way and just learn about Him as He is, or rather, who He’s revealed Himself to be in His Word and throughout His Creation?

What if we could re-learn and re-think what we each individually believe about God and honestly get to know Him not as this distant, abstract religious entity but as something of an Author – the Author of Authors – who has a grand story to tell that He wants to share with each and every one of us?

In addition to “The Author of Life”, I had another audiobook created and published as well (“The Seed of Haman”). I’ve recently started writing the second book of the series (with plans for a third!), so the first book seemed to be the next best choice, particularly since it has a wider audience and is fiction rather than non-fiction. The narrator did a fantastic job!

This audiobook can also be found at ChirpBooks, Spotify, Audible, and many other retailers.

The synopsis for the book is:

In the heart of Iran, a dark family secret has been passed from father to son, mother to daughter, generation to generation — a line unbroken by time. And Dr. Shahzad Yavari, the professor of geopolitics at Tehran University, is destined to become the next recipient of this legacy.

After the sudden death of his father, Dr. Yavari learns of the most closely-guarded secret of his family: an astonishing lineage the stretches back more than three thousand years, and the inheritance of not only a kingdom lost, but a kingdom stolen from them. With this revelation, an ancient vendetta is reawakened and Yavari quickly begins rising to power in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Deep inside the Quds Uranium Enrichment Facility near Qom, the scientists and technicians are under constant surveillance by the ever-watchful eye of the Iranian Republican Guard as the newest, fastest centrifuges are brought online. Within months, Iran’s nuclear program at Quds will be producing several warheads per year.

To counter the growing threat of a nuclearized Iran, a team of Israeli agents has been dispatched to Qom with the sole objective of stopping the enrichment program at Quds by any means necessary.

Watching and Waiting

Like many other men, I like to build things, fix things, tinker with things, make things better (insert Tim Allen grunting sounds here!). I suppose it’s part of our male-nature such that when there’s a problem, we men feel compelled to fix it. In my long career as a software developer, there’s seldom a problem that cannot be fixed in one way or another, even if that means throwing all the code out the window and starting from scratch. In fact, sometimes that’s the best solution: take the lessons learned and start over from Line 1. Same with writing: you can always Shift-Delete that entire chapter (or manuscript!) and start over from scratch.

But in life, it’s not that simple — nor easy or painless. We usually can’t just click “New Life” and start fresh. Our baggage sticks with us, even if it’s only just inside. That means our life — our heart, mind, and soul — needs to be fixed; we can’t just start over and pretend that the bad stuff never happened.

For a long time, my wife and I have had conflict and tension in our marriage that we can’t seem to find any real resolution to. We’ve tried many different things to try to fix it, but the tension is still there. Earlier this afternoon when I was praying about everything, I heard God gently speaking to me about the situation and our marriage, but this time was different. This time, I felt Him clearly telling me that He doesn’t want me to try to fix it; maybe He hasn’t all this time and I just haven’t been listening. In fact, I think He wants me to stop  “doing” and focus on “being” and to simply trust Him. Listen to Him. Obey Him. He wants me to simply wait on Him and (gasp! anything but this!) be patient.

As I thought on His words for awhile, I came to the conclusion that He’s probably right — okay, He’s 10000000% right. (He IS God, after all!) Perhaps a solution or even a resolution is not what He’s after in all this (or at least not at this time). Maybe — just maybe, He wants my obedience rather than my results. Maybe there are other lessons that He’s teaching that I need to learn first.

Like Phil and all he went through at Big Idea, maybe this conflict is really about me and my wife (and us) learning some lessons that cannot be learned in any other way — deep, hard lessons that involve both our persons at the lowest, deepest levels. In His great providence, our love and commitment to one another has remained strong, even through these deep hurts and upheavals. Yes, there are terribly hard questions that have been asked and left unanswered, yet would those questions have been asked under any other circumstances? Not likely. Would many of the great works of art, books, or plays/movies have ever been written under any other circumstances that didn’t involve tremendous pain, tension, or conflict? Definitely not.

In the Christian walk, there are times of pruning from our Gardener. That’s what He does: a clip here and a snip there, and sometimes even a saw is laid against one of our wayward branches. All pruning is for our ultimate benefit, our ultimate good, and He knows what He’s doing. To the tree, pruning is never pleasant — it’s downright painful and seems cruel and heartless. How the tree must despise the gardener at times! But God is our Divine Gardener, and He knows what He’s making of us and what’s best for us — even when we don’t.

Especially when we don’t.

So what’s the Gardener up to in this time of trial and pruning? In looking at myself and my own heart, selfishness in one form or another has always been there deep inside, no matter how selfless, helpful, and giving I may happen to be. My objects of selfishness have changed over the years, from toys to cars to money to hobbies to free-time to control to you-name-it. The thing is, I know that I tend towards selfishness and that it’s not good, so I purposely do things to counter it, but that selfishness is still there lurking around the corner.

Now, I’m not only speaking of the selfishness that we typically think of when we hear/use the word, such as greed or materialism or lack of sharing. When we think of the word “selfish” we tend to think of a child refusing to share their toys with others, a miser like Scrooge who refuses to give a penny to someone in need, or Gordon Gekko pronouncing “Greed is good! Greed is right!” But that’s too basic and rudimentary.

There’s a deep selfishness in each of us that runs to our very core that began with Adam and Eve that makes us want to put ourselves, our desires, and our will ahead of anything and everything. When it came to their choice of whether to eat the forbidden-fruit or not, it was their self-ish-ness — their decision to but their own “self” and their will over God and His — that at their core drove them to disobey Him. They wanted their “eyes to be opened” so they could “be like God” and put themselves first above all others (including God Himself).

When it comes to marriage — ALL marriages — there’s inherent conflict because there are two self-ish people who desire their own way and will which usually comes at the expense of the other person or the marriage itself. Marriage was the first human institution designed — and blessed — by God back in the Garden of Eden and can bring both the greatest of joys in life or the worst of pains, a paradise or a prison. And what determines each comes down to the degree of self-ish-ness of the couple in that marriage.

On a spiritual and practical level, marriage is a perfectly polished self-ish-ness mirror; it forces us to look at ourselves, particularly as we are seen through the eyes of our spouses. In fact, most people don’t really realize how self-ish they really are until after they get married or have children, when they’re no longer able to put themselves above everyone else. Marriage and parenting forces people to step off their own pedestal and put someone above themselves. Marriage only works when both people are putting the other ahead of themselves — when both are practicing self-less-ness rather than our built-in self-ish-ness.

God wants to remake, remold, and reshape us in His image, but our inherent self-ish-ness resists Him at every step of the way. So what’s He to do in order to teach us about real patience, true self-less-ness, and genuine sacrificial love? Just offhand, He allows (or even puts) us into positions that we cannot easily get out of, sometimes in which we cannot “do” much of anything but learn to wait, trust, hope, and love even when it hurts — especially when it terribly hurts.

When God wants us to learn how to trust Him, He allows us to be put into situations in which we have no other choice BUT to trust Him.

When God wants us to learn patience, He allows us to be put into situations where being patient and waiting on Him is all we can do. He often makes us wait and wait and wait until it’s absurd. And then wait some more.

When God wants us to learn to stop trying to control things, He allows us to be put into situations in which we have zero control over much of anything. In those times of helplessness and being out of control, we can’t even control what we think about!

When God wants us to learn to be less selfish (and less self-ish!) and hold things more loosely, He takes them from our hands or waits for us to let them go before He can give us what really matters.

Lessons from Bob and Larry – Part 2

This is Part 2 of Lessons from Bob and Larry

A funny thing happens when some people become Christians. We get all “on fire for God” and begin dreaming up all these great things we want to do for Him and His Kingdom. After all, the world is lost and He commands us to go reach them, right? That means we’re to go out and do something and do it NOW. For some that means door-to-door preaching, teaching, bake-sales, volunteering, missions-work, and on and on.

In church, we’re often taught about spiritual gifts and how we are to find the ones that God has given us, and then go out and use them to the best of our ability; we are to get out there and “do something!” For Phil Vischer (see Part 1), that meant making funny animated videos with Bible lessons using talking vegetables. (I’ve always imagined God pointing out a couple of the episodes to some of His children up there and seeing what they thought of them, you know, like asking David his opinion of “Dave and Giant Pickle!).

For myself, that “doing something” meant writing some Bible software and then later Christian-oriented book after book. I suppose it’s a natural response (especially as Americans!) to want to “do something — anything!” for God and find your divine purpose in it. And if those things line up with your personal skills or even dreams, then it’s all that much better, right?

Wrong. Or at least not necessarily fully “right” — particularly in His eyes and His plans for us.

When we become born-again and set out to start walking with God — really, truly walking with God — a curious thing happens which many of us either miss or we’re forced to learn the hard way later on. And that truth is that God is far, FAR more concerned with who we’re becoming rather than what we’re doing for Him. (Read that again!).

You see, God — in His infinite wisdom and innate understanding of us and our inborn pride, arrogance, and even our lofty dreams (or are they really idols?) — He’s willing to put us through just about anything to help us to become the people He intends for us to be. Anything. And very often, the more dramatic (or harrowing), the better. Sadly, that’s often how we have to really learn those lessons for ourselves: by touching that hot stove that our mother repeatedly warned us not to. We don’t really “get it” until we feel that pain and experience it firsthand for ourselves.

In His infinitely love and wisdom, God’s priority for us as His adopted sons and daughters is to remake us in His image, to refine us, to cut out the sin, pride, and selfish/self-centered elements of our character and our flesh/sin-nature. Unfortunately, those usually aren’t our priorities — which is where disappointments, discouragements, and even suffering enters into the picture. We’re often too busy “doing something” to consider what He really wants with us.

The deepest, hardest lessons can only really be learned through deep hardships.

Now, don’t get me wrong about the “doing something” aspect of our walk with Him. Jesus Himself told us to “occupy until He returns” (i.e. don’t just sit around waiting for Him to return). God knows and even cares about our dreams — but NOT at the expense of His relationship with us or our relationships with others. There’s a point in which dreams become idols, and He knows that point in each of us far better than we ourselves do.

Though I’ve written this before (several times in fact!), God is far more concerned with our obedience rather the results of our efforts for Him. And that’s not merely for the sake of mere obedience as much as the refinement of ourselves and our will. Though He told us to spread the Gospel to all the world, He doesn’t really “need” us to do that (He can use a Divine Billboard, right?). But He indeed wants us to participate in His plan to redeem the world and bring others into the Kingdom — and shaping, refining, and remaking us in the process. However, in the process of our sanctification, He desires obedience more than results, or more Biblically, He desires obedience rather than sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22).

For us humans, we’re much more concerned with the destination rather than the journey — but not so with God. He has a knack for doing things the odd way to us anyway, right? Just open the Bible and pick a story, like Moses and his staff, Gideon and his lamps, David and his slingshot, Jonah and the fish (not a whale!), and of course, the multitude of animal sacrifices which culminated in His Son on a cross to redeem us. The incalculable amount of pain, anguish, and suffering that Christ endured just to redeem us!

In our lives, we’re much more concerned with what we’re “doing” and how we’re going to solve a problem or get through a tough spot to get back on Easy Street — but not Him. He’s much more focused on what we’re “being” and “becoming” rather than where we’re “going”. Since the destination is certain after we’re saved — Heaven with Him — that matter has already been settled; now it’s just a matter of getting there in the way He wants us to go.

God is far more concerned with our thoughts, prayers, attitudes, hearts, and our obedience rather than our comforts and accomplishments. Most of us just want to get on with life and get to the good parts, but not Him. He wants US to become the good parts and be the salt and light in this world. He’s content to let us suffer in the stew and marinade in the mess because He knows that that’s the only way to teach us the lessons He wants us to learn.

Perhaps it’s time for less “doing” on our part and more “being”…

Lessons from Bob and Larry

Have you stopped and asked yourself — really asked yourself — what in the world is God up to when everything is going off the rails? Where is He? Why is He silent? Why doesn’t He intervene?

Though this post has been in my backlog for six months (incessantly nagging at me!), it’s even more important and relatable now with the ongoing war in Ukraine. Where is God? He sees exactly what’s happening there and yet He doesn’t seem to be all that concerned.

Biblically, we know He does indeed care for the plight of the innocent and loves peace and absolutely hates unjust wars such as this Russian invasion. Yet He doesn’t seem to be responding to the prayers of literally millions of people lifting up their desperate voices to Him. Millions of innocent men, women, children are suffering and crying out to Him and yet there seems to be little more than…silence.

What is He up to? Where is God when we need Him the most? As CS Lewis once wrote,

“When you are happy, so happy you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember yourself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise, you will be — or so it feels— welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence.”

Yet He is there. He’s always there — even when it seems like He isn’t. And He’s working — yes, He is working even in His apparent silence in this terrible war.

On the weekend after my grandfather died sixteen years ago (this month, in fact), I was in Chicago and spied a familiar face in the airport terminal; I knew for certain that I had seen this man before, but I couldn’t place him. Since the airline let us choose our own seats, I ended up sitting next to him and introduced myself shortly before take-off. It was Phil Vischer, the creator of “Veggie Tales” and the voice of Bob the Tomato, Mr. Lundt, and several others! We chatted for a short time and I asked for his autograph, as he was (and still is!) the most famous celebrity I’ve met in person (with the exception of Dennis Prager). And while he was polite enough (and even friendly), he seemed tired or even sad and didn’t seem like he was up for much conversation. He ended up sleeping (or reading) most of the way to Denver and then we went separate ways.

A few years later, I read that his company, Big Idea Productions, had been sold about that same time, but it wasn’t until I read Phil’s book last year “Me, Myself and Bob: A True Story About Dreams, God, and Talking Vegetables” did I understand why he seemed like he was exhausted or even discouraged — because he was. His book is about how he had all these big dreams for God and His Kingdom inspired by Walt Disney, and that he wanted to create an animation studio (and even a theme-park) to rival Disneyland/World. The technology had come along at just the right time, God had provided the financing and the right people at the right moment several times, and it seemed like it was His Will to make Big Idea the “Christian Disney” for kids, families, and the country, to help shape our culture and even maybe turn it back to God in some ways.

But then Phil’s dream with Big Idea died — or rather, his dream was killed both by forces outside his control and his own missteps at times. The storm clouds rolled in and didn’t depart. Soon the dominoes quickly began to fall and the company fell apart and was eventually sold off. Big Idea and Veggie Tales went from having incredible, exponential revenue to bankruptcy in a few short years. The Christian Disney was no more. God could have easily intervened many times, but He didn’t.

Much of the book is about Phil Vischer telling the story of Big Idea, its rise and fall, and also even apologizing to his former employees, investors, fanbase, and others. The last few chapters are about his personal “lessons learned”, why Disney worked and Big Idea didn’t, and those other hard lessons that are only learned by failure. That in itself bears repeating: Some lessons are only learned by failure (or at least by hardships and struggles).

In the end, Phil realized that God had allowed that struggle and failure to reach deep into something that was much bigger and much more important to God than Big Idea: his heart and relationship with Him. Was Phil’s dream more important to him than God and his relationship with Him? How could God (and Phil) really know? Easy — by taking that dream away and seeing what remained.

That is the sort of God that our God is: one who would allow the failure of a Christian media company that was impacting millions of lives (especially children!) to reach one man who needed to be reached the most (as well as others). Is the “message” and its distribution as important as the hearts of those who are spreading it? That’s a good question. It seems to me that God is more concerned about our hearts and day-to-day lives than the means and methods and channels of spreading His message.

With that in mind, what else might God be willing to allow to fail — or bring to the verge of failure — in order to reach someone? What extreme, almost-absurd lengths is He willing to go to in order to redirect someone back onto His path for them? You might be surprised. We ALL might be surprised.

Stay tuned for Part 2…

It Wasn’t For Nothing

This morning after I had finished my daily YouVersion readings, I was scrolling through Instagram a little and stumbled across a post that caught my attention.

There on the screen was a middle-aged man in a gray tee-shirt lying on his back in his driveway, blankly staring up at the sky. He’s not hurt — at least not physically — but he appears to be all but spent. Worn out. Defeated. Exhausted. Overwhelmed by whatever was happening such that all he could do was lay down on the hard cement next to his car. The caption of the video read, “Imagine Jesus whispering this to you…”

What made me really stop and watch — aside from the fact that 99.9% of all social-media posts are NOT of people laying on their driveways — was that it captured my mental picture of myself lately. My initial reaction was, “Oh my God, that’s me! How did they know? That’s exactly how I see my life right now! That’s exactly how I feel inside!”

And then the man closes his tired eyes as a quiet voice begins whispering to him. He doesn’t sob or convulse in tears, he just lays there, listening silently.

It wasn’t for nothing.
   Everything that you’ve been through,
It wasn’t for nothing.

I created you with purpose
   And even through the darkest valley,
You continued to love Me and follow Me.

And I will bless you.

And then I began to sob, those big, ugly, heartfelt sobs that come from the pit of your soul. These beautiful words ministered directly to my heart this morning in a way that nothing else has been able to for quite some time. Again, how did they know? How could they have seen? After all, I hide my emotions pretty well to everyone at the gym, at church, and of course, everyone I work with. How could anyone know exactly what I’ve been feeling, and more importantly, what I’ve been needing to hear for so long?

But He knew. And He cared enough to simply drop that into my feed this morning.

He always knows. And He cares. Our Father sees us in our hardships, our sorrows, our pain, our messes — yes, even in the messes that we ourselves have made — and He cares. He loves us and He cares.

The last seven years of my journey here have been one major upheaval after another, with some better and some worse (and some very worse!). There have been so many changes, transitions, and surprises (especially within the last year), that I almost don’t know where to begin. And while each setback or major life-change is understandable (or even sensible) within the context of the different situations and circumstances at the time, when stepping back and looking at the journey as a whole, it seems like nothing short of a train-wreck in which very little makes sense anymore. No train-wrecks ever make much sense.

But when we go though these deep, dark valleys in which we can’t even begin to see the end, He sees and He knows. Sometimes we run, sometimes we walk, sometimes we crawl, and sometimes when its all just too much, we lay down and stare up at the endless sky above us, searching for a glimmer of light to give us just a little more hope to keep going.

Our faith in Him, our trust in Him, our love for Him, and our dogged clinging to Him through it all — it matters. And it matters greatly to Him. As Job so aptly said during his own ordeal, “Though He slay me, I will trust in Him.” (Job 13:15)

It wasn’t for nothing.
   Everything that you’ve been through,
It wasn’t for nothing.

I created you with purpose
   And even through the darkest valley,
You continued to love Me and follow Me.

And I will bless you.

It isn’t for nothing. He sees and He knows.

It’s my hope that others will see this and be ministered to just as I was today. Regardless of how we may be feeling or what’s overwhelming us, our Father knows. And He cares. And one day when we finally meet Him, He’ll wrap His strong, gentle, loving arms around us and whisper directly into our broken hearts:

“It wasn’t for nothing…”

@jesusthegreatlight
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CX1LofUh2V7/

The Saint, the Surfer, and the CEO

After not blogging for months (or longer!), this will be the second post within the last few days! I suppose that’s what happens when juggling work, writing, and just life-in-general. I’ve found that reading a couple of books outside of whatever topic I’m entrenched in between writing projects (and just along the way) is a good way to refocus, re-energize, and of course, relax.

“The Saint, the Surfer, and the CEO” is a book I stumbled across several months ago, likely because it had “surfer” in the title — and “saint” — which is rather rare in itself (the “CEO” part wasn’t quite as appealing to me, to be honest). And I don’t usually go back and re-read very many books, but this one was an exception because of some of its insights and perspectives into inner heart-work, failures, human-nature, wisdom, and just life in general. So last week before the holidays, I began to re-read it to see what more I could glean from it.

The book is mostly written from a First Person point of view around a character named “Jack” who was recently in a bad car accident that put him in the hospital for several days. The day after he wakes up, an older man (“Cal”) with terminal cancer is wheeled into his room and they strike up a conversation. Cal begins to tell him about his life, his family, his successes and failures, his regrets, and the wisdom about life he’s acquired along the way. During their exchange and long discussion, Cal tells him about the Final Questions when we get to our life’s end (according to the book) and how he learned to answer them:

1. Did I live wisely?
2. Did I love well?
3. Did I serve greatly?

They continue their discussion long into the night and Cal tells him about the three mentors that helped him answer those Final Questions for himself. When Jack wakes up the next morning, Cal has died in his sleep from the cancer. Upon his discharge from the hospital, Jack is given a package at the checkout desk — a letter revealing that Cal was actually Jack’s father who left when he was little, along with three first-class airline tickets to introduce him to his three life-mentors: the Saint (a priest in Rome), the Surfer (an ex-marketing guru in Hawaii), and the CEO (a finance executive in New York). Each mentor has agreed to spend one month with Jack, teaching, guiding, and sharing life with him in order to help him begin to answer those three Final Questions for himself — something that had taken Cal most of his life to do.

So off Jack goes, first to the Saint to learn how to live wisely, then to the Surfer to learn about loving well, and lastly to the CEO, who taught him how to serve others. In the end, he is transformed from the inside-out and his life-perspective and philosophy becomes radically different as he is taught to embrace all of life, not merely the good times/events, along with him learning how to answer those Final Questions for himself.

The book contains a great deal of wisdom about living day by day, about learning from our big failures and disappointments in life, about dreams and goals, about relating to others, and about being thankful or even joyful about the many “gifts” that come into our lives each day. While much of the book is good in that regard, as a Christian I tend to disagree with several of the underlying premises in the book, such as “looking within yourself for the answers” and “recovering your true self that was diminished as you were socialized”. The Bible makes it abundantly clear that we don’t have all the answers and that our hearts are easily deceived, so we need God and His Word/Presence to give us true wisdom, self-control, and to remake us from the inside out (Romans 12:2) and continually transform us.

As with many other self-help and philosophy books, using the “Eat the meat, Spit out the bones” methodology still results in gleaning a good amount of wisdom and perspective from the book. All in all, “The Saint, the Surfer, and the CEO” is a great read for anyone starting out, getting a new start, or just going though their adult years (especially their middle-age years!).

In the end, we’ll all have to answer those Final Questions for ourselves: “Did I live wisely?”, “Did I love well?”, and “Did I serve greatly?”.