Luke, I Am Your Father!

By Tendai Kawadza

If this is the worst entry you’ve read so far, thank Evan Johnson! He tasked me with a blog entry and gave very little guidance, I’ll take a stab at it though. 

As a husband and father some of my happiest moments are not when we go on an outing or vacation - they are the spontaneous moments at home when somehow both my kids end up in my lap and we’re face to face laughing. It’s tough to come to terms with the fact that these kind of moments won’t last forever. It has been quite a transition over the last few years, moving from being a son and a brother to taking on the additional role of a husband and, for the last almost four years, father.

The bible gives us many references for the nature of our relationship to God - King, Father, Lord, etc - so the way I look at it is we have a father who happens to be a king and also created the universe. God has called us his children (Gal. 3:26). His desire is to have a familial relationship with us, Christian or not (Gal. 4:4-7). One of the reasons it’s so important to understand God in the father context is a father’s care. Their kids drive them to be better. They want their kids to do well, even exceed them. Many people who have scars from their earthly father have a tough time with this concept. If this is you, take some time and ask him to deepen your relationship so you not only see him as Lord but also as father. The world’s message about God is that he’s some kind of puppet master, man-behind-the-curtain character who just wants people to obey him and abide by his rules. 

However, when we start seeing ourselves as his children we move further away from that worldly mindset. We see a father who wants what’s best for us: "Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your father in heaven give the holy spirit to those who ask him!” Luke 11:11-13. We also see a father who’ll do anything for us (John 3:16). So maybe you've had daddy drama, join the club - find encouragement, you have a heavenly father who delights in you (Zeph. 3:17), a father who’ll never leave you nor forsake you (Joshua 1:5).

God's Love in Marriage

By Barry Rager

Amy and I got married on May 14, 2005.  She was 21. I was 23.  At that age, you feel like you have a pretty good understanding of life.  To prepare for marriage, we read all of the books we were supposed to read, went through all of the premarital counseling, and discussed all of the questions we had with some of our older friends.  We were prepared, right?  

Nearly twelve years later I can say for a fact that we had no idea what was going on. Today, we are both very different people from what we were in 2005.  We think differently on many issues, our theology has been challenged and refined, and when you throw four kids into the mix, things are always crazy.

And as I am sure you have stereotypically heard, there are good times and there are bad times.  The same is true for us.  The good times have been great and impactful.  While I would not say that all the hard times have been great I know that they have been just as impactful- possibly even more so- than the good. 

God’s love is what has led Amy and I to still be devoted to one another and crazy about each other after twelve years.  Amy is not the same lady I married, she is so much more now!  I know her more and she knows me more, we have grown together.  The binding force for all of this is not some secret that we possess or me knowing that I could not do any better (which is true of course) but the love of God.

Through our faith in Christ, God put his love into our hearts (Romans 5:5).  This love has been on display in a multitude of ways in our marriage.  But one of the ways I have seen it on display the most is not a way I would have anticipated in 2005, it has been through hard conversations. 

Now you may be thinking, how in the world are hard conversations and God’s love related?  

What God desires for us is better than what we desire for ourselves.  As Christians, when we come to God in the brokenness of our sin and ask him to save us by faith he does!  But he does not leave us as we are.  God shapes us and molds us into the image of His Son, Jesus Christ (Romans 8:29-30).  While the outcome is always good, sometimes the means by which God uses the Holy Spirit to make us more like Jesus can be hard.  God loves us enough that he does not pass over the hard conversations. God has used my marriage to Amy to shape and mold me more than I ever could have imagined. 

It is an act of love to have hard conversations with your spouse.  I cannot even number the times God has used Amy to show me sin, sometimes hidden from my view, in my life.  Was it easy for her to have those conversations with me?  No, but she loves me.  Her love moved her to action because she desired better for me.  In the moment none of these conversations were enjoyable. Looking back though, I am so glad Amy had the love to speak the truth to me.  

Is it easy to have hard conversations?  No.  Both of us in our marriage have had hard conversations with the other with the wrong attitude and approach.  That usually ends bad.  But when we come to dialogue by speaking the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15) the situation usually ends in one of us or both of us looking more like Jesus.

Amy and I both look more like Jesus today than we did twelve years ago because God’s love has been the foundation for all of this.  I look forward to seeing what he will do - through the good and the bad - in and through our lives and how he will bind our hearts together more and more.

Marriage and God's Love

By Holly Moran

I’m not going to sit here, type an awe-inspiring blog, and act like I am some expert on marriage. I’m just not. My husband Scott and I have been married for just over 2 and a half years. I feel like I’ve learned some good stuff, but really the foundation of what I know about marriage comes from the Bible.

When I was a little girl, I always knew (or at least I thought I knew) that I would get married someday. My best friend and I did the whole pretend-wedding thing where we put on our mothers’ wedding dresses and smooched stuffed animals who were supposed to be the most amazing husbands ever.  I guess you could say we had unrealistic expectations about what marriage would look like. But we were just kids, right? Personally, I think most of us have pretty unrealistic expectations of marriage up until the day we say “I do.” How could we not? We watch all these romantic movies and read romantic novels that fill our brains with fluff. 

Even in Christian culture, this can happen. You may be familiar with the classic wedding verse 1 Corinthians 13:1-3. It goes like this (cue a harp playing in the background), “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.” Beautiful. Isn’t it? But let’s just zoom out here for a second and look at the context of this passage. The apostle Paul is writing a letter to a church in Corinth, a Roman Colony, around 50 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection. These people were struggling with things like selfishness, sexual immorality, idolatry…you know, the little stuff. Let’s just say they weren’t getting it, so Paul sent this letter with the intent of calling out their sin and pointing them back toward Christ.  

I’m not saying this passage can’t be applied to marriage. It most certainly can. But we need to look at it in the right context. Paul is not describing love as an ooey-gooey feeling that we have toward someone we are attracted to. He is talking about the action we should take toward others. So if we pull this back to marriage that would mean being patient with our spouse. Being kind to our spouse. Not envying what our spouse has. Not being rude to our spouse. Because if we think about it, this is how God treats us. He is patient with us. He is kind to us. He IS love. God endures all things. God never ends. 

You can’t expect your spouse to always love like Paul tells the Corinthians to love in his letter. You know why? Because humans aren’t perfect. You are not perfect, so how can you expect your spouse to be? There is not a single human being on this earth who can love in the perfect way that God can. Now I’m not saying that you and your spouse shouldn’t try to love each other like this. It just seems that as humans, our tendency is to try and fix the other person. Just the other day, I couldn’t find my headphones. I automatically assumed that Scott borrowed and lost them. I assumed this because he did this in the past with a pair of my scissors and maybe a few other things. In that moment of judgment, I wanted to fix him and make him more responsible…make him a better spouse. I wasn’t examining myself. I should have asked myself, “How can I love Scott in this situation? How can I work on not being resentful?” It turns out, I was the one who misplaced the headphones. 

So ask yourself: are you trying to be the kind of lover God calls you to be? The one who practices patience and kindness and puts others’ needs before his or her own. Try focusing on your qualities rather than on your spouse’s. And remember: we cannot love our spouse or others without God’s love. 1 John 4:19 says, “We love because He first loved us.” Dwell in God’s love. Try to understand it. Pray that you can love like God did when He sent His son Jesus to die for us. Then hopefully, your marriage will begin to look more like you had always expected it would.

Three Ways That Newness Is Good For Us

By Jonathan Groves

Where’s the grocery store?  This place looked closer on GPS.  I have no idea where that is.  What’s your name again?  Newness can be annoying and even frustrating.  Sometimes it goes even deeper: do I belong here?  What’s the plan?  Is there a plan?  What was I thinking?!?!

Fortunately, newness isn’t new, at least not to the Creator of all things.  Crazy transitions didn’t happen for the first time when you moved away from home or changed your major or took some seemingly illogical step of faith. In fact, newness is something God has been using to shape His people and unfold His plan for a long time.

In Genesis 12, newness takes center stage with a guy named Abram.  When I struggle with newness, it helps me to reflect on just how crazy this whole thing was.  God shows up and dumps all this on him like a bucket of cold water.  He says, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you.”  Basically, God tells Abram to uproot his family, pack up, and start going to a destination he doesn’t even know yet.  That’s newness on a whole other level.

But God is at work in the newness.  He’s doing a bunch of things.  He’s teaching Abram about his own lack of faith, and He’s showing him just who he can trust.  It’s a lesson Abram needs to learn over and over again—and one that I do, too.  Newness is hard, but it’s good.  What does God do in newness?

God uses newness to show us Himself.   The most comfortable thing about familiarity is that it is manageable.  Even if it’s not good, it works.  But when God injects newness, we’re reminded of just how powerless we are and how wonderfully powerful He is.  If Abram had stayed where he had always been, he would not have seen God as the powerful provider that He is.

God uses newness to reveal His plan.  God tells Abram he’s going to make him “a great nation…in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”  God’s talking about the family line of this guy who is currently wandering for a home, a line that will eventually lead down to Jesus.  God is setting a rescue plan in motion for the world through this newness in Abram’s life.  This transition will have ripples that God uses to literally change the world.

God uses newness to make us more like Him.  If you keep reading his story, you see that Abram goes from a guy who is willing to pawn off his wife to save his skin to a man willing to sacrifice the thing most precious to him for God.  When God led Abram on this journey, He was working on his heart.  Newness works on our hearts, shaking out the unimportant stuff we’ve held onto for too long. It helps us focus us on what’s really important and leads us to a deeper and more glorious dependence on Him.

Newness isn’t easy, but it is good.  Praise God that He pushes us out of the familiar and into something far better.

Bible Before Netflix

By Craig Bannister

The start of every New Year serves as an opportunity to get a fresh start on some personal goals and habits. Whether it’s losing weight, ditching social media, or something different altogether, January is the starting line.

As January was approaching, my wife Brilyn and I were facing a problem. Every day, we had every intention of doing a devotional together or reading scripture together, and almost every day we somehow found a way to be too busy to get it done. Midnight would always roll around and we would both agree it was too late and that we should get some sleep. I think it became a motivation problem for us. We had no problem spending a couple hours watching our favorite Netflix shows, but reading together for 15 minutes always seemed like a daunting task. We realized it wasn’t a busy problem so much as it was an “us” problem. If we took away Netflix, we had a huge window of time to read together. Stick with me here. I’m not saying your New Year’s resolution should be giving up Netflix. I’m just putting forward the idea that maybe we aren’t as busy as we think. 

As a kid, when my parents wanted me to do a chore, they would withhold a reward until I completed it. For example, I couldn’t play video games until I got my homework done. Brilyn and I decided to implement the same kind of idea on ourselves. We haven’t stopped watching Netflix. We have just delayed watching it until we get our daily reading done. We’ve made it a habit to sit down and read together before we turn on Netflix. 

I was recently at an event where a church was giving away free Bibles. They had Bibles for people of all ages free for the taking. As I looked over the table, I noticed a one-year Bible in chronological order. It struck me because I began a one-year Bible challenge in high school, and chose to read it in chronological order but failed to complete the challenge. I grabbed two copies and decided this is what Bryan and I would read each day. We started reading together soon after I picked them up sometime in late October, and we stuck with it. If the structure of an assigned reading everyday would help you, there are plans on the Bible App and all over the Internet. I personally enjoyed having a physical Bible with the plan built in.

The New Year has officially come, and though it’s not an official resolution, we have continued to hold each other accountable with our reading. In the beginning, it was all about getting our reading done so we could watch our favorite shows. Now, it’s turned into more of a discussion each night. We have questions and comments about things we are studying so it’s more than knocking a chore out of the way to get to something we want. We look forward to it now. It was never about dreading reading our Bibles in the first place. We read when we could, but it wasn’t consistent. However, this simple idea has helped us create a habit that we plan to carry through 2017 and beyond.

If you aren’t hopelessly addicted to Netflix like us but struggle reading your Bible daily, maybe something similar could help you stay consistent. It could even be as simple as setting a certain time every day to read or reading before a meal. It’s whatever works best for you. In our crazy busy lives, when we are deliberate, we can still set aside time and dig into our Bibles daily.

Margo the Cat

By Micha Kandal

I’ve always liked cats. And who doesn’t love kittens? I grew up with them so I am very aware of how they operate, which is on their own terms.

Being an independent 22-year-old, I decided that it was time to be a cat owner. Why not? A Facebook opportunity brought me into being an official cat owner. My good friend Kirsten was tagged in a post that was filled with 8 furry creatures. I liked the post. I asked my roommates. Two days later, I drove with Kirsten two hours north to get this new commitment. 

The car ride back was great. As I befriended this orange and white animal (making sure she didn’t trap herself underneath the seats or die prematurely 25 minutes away from home), it set in. “It” being the heavy weight of this new responsibility. Knowing I am responsible for keeping this cat alive for the next 10-13 years.

I don’t think I’m ready for this.

I’ve had Margo for 5 months. She’s still alive and well, enough to eat the tape I’ve placed on the counters to keep her off of them. To say that getting her was the best possible choice I could have made wouldn’t necessarily be true. We’ve had our good moments, and there are times I’ve thought about throwing her into Kirsten’s living room and then running away…like when she eats the tape.

This story of Margo, though, mirrors my expectation versus reality.

I think that as humans, we’re so good about building up situations, scenarios, and even opportunities in our minds. I think we like to operate on the 0-100 spectrum. Our reactions range from not caring or being invested to EVERYTHING IS ABSOLUTELY THIS WAY OR ELSE. At least, this is my very natural tendency. It’s gonna be awesome, 100. And, if it’s not, we’re disappointed and all motivation is gone. I don’t care. I’m done. Back to zero. 

This is a lot like my walk with Jesus. 

I get so lost in my head about big life things and changes. I overthink and overanalyze. A new project. A new friendship. Any change, expected or unexpected. I build these up, more often than not, ridiculously high and unrealistic. And then it (life, the date, the conversation, the plan) doesn’t even remotely go the way I wanted. I get disappointed and frustrated and all of the other emotions in between. This emotional gamut gets aimed directly at Jesus. I play the blame game, and then I have an argument with the Creator about why he’s unfair and why my way was better. What-ifs and maybe-when’s are my favorite words to bargain with when I talk with God.

Reading these words back to myself sounds RIDICULOUS. Why am I arguing with God? Why am I expecting Him to cave and say “Oh, yeah, good call Micha.” 

But I do. I doubt, twist, overthink, manipulate, and allow all of these dark things to take residence in my mind. And as long as I let them stay, they grow. I take matters into my own hands, and I complain that I can’t hold onto any of the blessings or freedoms-from-heartaches God is trying to give me. Daily. 

Discovering that I do this has been so humbling. It’s a hard truth, but it’s so refreshing to know there’s a change that needs to happen and that I know the answer. This answer can often feel kind of intimidating though. Sometimes it’s easier to stand in the dark just because it’s familiar.

Putting it into practice is where the struggle lives. At the same time, I can feel Jesus pulling me nearer and nearer. I can hear him telling me more often than not, “I’m proud of you” and “You’re getting it!” God also gets my attention by speaking directly through the people in my community. So cool. So convicting. 

Learning the new normal of letting go of expectation and control has been hard. It has been harder than keeping Margo off of the counters (and maybe equally as frustrating). 

Learning how to choose God, to choose the life of living in an active stillness, and abiding in Him is such a big commitment. It’s intimidating and sometimes I’m fearful it won’t bring me the feeling of contentment or being made whole. Yet, this daily practice of surrendering all of my expectations has caused me to grow more in these past 3 months than I could have ever imagined. It’s still the most difficult thing I do some days.

But the complete and total peace that comes from this new thought altering lifestyle is so refreshing. My joy is becoming as real as the warmth you feel from the sun in the middle of June. It makes the freedom worth fighting for and the blessings so much greater.

My encouragement to you as an amateur cat owner and a person who gets obsessed with expectations and improbable realities is to open your hands. Literally, emotionally, spiritually. Drop the things that weigh you down, even for just 5 minutes. Ask for freedom. Declare rest. I promise that things WILL start to change. It might be the longest 5 minutes of your day, but it’ll also be the most life giving. 

Take heart & take back your freedom friends. You won’t regret it.

Brand New

By Brittany Kent

New - not existing before: made, introduced, or discovered recently or now for the first time

New year, new resolutions, new goals, new you.

I think in lyrics, so for all you Ben Rector fans...

I feel like for the first time in a long time I am not afraid,

I feel like a kid, I never thought I'd feel like this again.

When I close my eyes and don't even care if anyone sees me dancing.

Like I can fly and I don't even think of touching the ground.

It's the way that I feel when I'm with you

BRAND NEW

2 Corinthians 5:17

"Therefore if anyone is in Christ they are a new creation the old has passed away behold the new has come."

As a believer, this verse should bring so much hope! We are made new! The old is no more. Our sin is gone. Our shame is removed. Our identity is changed. We were once not a people, but now we are God’s people! Everyday is a new opportunity to grow closer to our Holy and Loving Dad!

However, if you're like me, you don't necessarily live in this freedom everyday. Lies from my past, fear of the future (or the unknown), and doubt in my identity are kept neatly shoved in a corner. Meanwhile, busyness and social media become my rhythm of life. I turn on autopilot, and I do the same things over and over again to avoid confrontation with the hope that I can live in comfortable “peace.”

Thankfully, God is loving, and His plans are better than mine. However, the truth is this monotony will continue to be reality apart from Christ. I can try to make changes. I can try to pull myself up by my bootstraps, but I will never be satisfied. I will never arrive.  The beauty of the gospel though is that in spite of sin (our missing the mark), God stepped into the picture through His Son Jesus. Jesus lived the perfect life, died the death we deserve, and rose to life. It is through Jesus' resurrection power that every believer has new life. (Ephesians 2, 1 Peter 1:3) God gives the official restart and offers it to everyone who would trust in His work and not their own.

I have learned a lot in the past year. I have moved back and forth between two states (8 months in Indiana and 4 in Alabama), transitioned into different ministry roles, switched jobs, traveled to new places, and made new friends. With anything new, it has not existed before. It is made or introduced. Last year, I remember sharing how much I hate change because I can’t control it, but this year is different. I have learned that change brings fresh perspective and a renewed sense of hope.

2 Corinthians 5:17 is a promise that is not dependent on our ability to make ourselves new. The verse says, “if anyone is in Christ, they are.” Not “they will be.” They are a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. God made me new and is still making me new. If it was up to me, I wouldn’t change. Change is hard. It requires work, and it takes consistency. However, Christ in me provides everything. Every day, God not only provides the opportunity to live out my new living identity, but He also gives me the strength to live in this identity.

Some days I feel like God is doing CPR, and other days I feel like He’s training me for a marathon, but the good news is the breath still comes from Him. God gives His Holy Spirit to those who believe in Him, and “ruah,” the Hebrew word for Spirit literally means breath.

Adopted into a New Family

By Ted Bourke

Well, here we are. In a flash, 2016 has come and gone like so many others and now we start afresh with 2017. With the start of a new year comes the desire for newness in a multitude of avenues. Resolutions about diets, exercising, reading, and other personal goals are set and attempted. The phrase "New year, new me" becomes a frequent mantra for people. People use the new year as a chance to start over, to make a change, to become new.

So how does this concept of newness coincide with our relationship with Christ? The answer is relatively straightforward. Ephesians 4:23-24 promises us that, in Christ, “ you (will) be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.”

We are made new in Him. He changes us, molds us, transforms us. The old is out, the new is in. Is it easy? Of course not - change is hard in whatever form it takes. But making a change and becoming new in Christ? It is so worth it. And we should never think that this only applies to young Christians who are newly on their journey with Christ. Everyone, no matter where they are, can find newness in Him - we should constantly be looking for ways to change and freshen our walk with Him.

Another way I look at this concept of newness is that when we commit ourselves to Christ, we are adopted into the great big family of God, thus beginning a new relationship with Him and with the people who have chosen to follow Him. Adoption is something very personal to my family - all four of my siblings are adopted from China. With each adoption, there came a sense of newness - new family, new environment, new life. There is this incredible feeling as I watched each one of my siblings experience that newness - a curiosity of what this new family would be like, an excitement over the possibilities, an apprehension of the unexpected. There was a chance to be made new with a new family, a family who loved and cared for them, a family who was ready to make that change alongside of them and be made new together as one.

This is how we are when we become new in Christ. We experience the same feelings as my siblings did - curiosity, excitement, apprehension. In my mind, God experiences the same incredible feelings I did each time I met my siblings whenever we give ourselves over to him and ask to be made new. It is so refreshing to know that He is in the business of second chances, of desiring us to make changes in our lives. Yes, it is exciting and, yes, it can fill us with apprehension. But, much the way my siblings had to rely on their new family to take care of them, we should find comfort in the fact that we have a God who will always be there for us

May this year be one of newness for all of us in whatever way you find it. I, for one, am excited about the the change happening for our church family. With our new building, we can reach and bring in so many more people. I firmly believe that, with the ground work that has already been laid, we can bring about a whole wave of newness in 2017 in this city.