Peter and God's wonderful refining process

i recently finished 1 Peter, i was reading and meditating on it slowly for a long time, and the book is all about good conduct as a Christian. What this means is righteous and blameless living, that when the Gentiles (unbelievers) revile you as evildoers, they may see your good conduct and be put to shame and glorify God in the end (essentially, be convicted because they accused you and out of this conviction, turn to the Lord and receive salvation). also, i love the character of Peter, because in his example you see so vividly the power of the Holy Spirit to transform a man. When Christ called him, he was young, impulsive, self-confident, self-righteous, strong in himself but also bold and fiery. He had the audacity to rebuke Jesus (when Jesus said to him "Get behind me Satan") and to say to Jesus that he'd be with him to the death (after which Christ told him he would deny Him 3 times). yet we see demonstrations of his boldness - he was the first to step out of the boat when Jesus walked on water. when Peter denies Christ, he is devastated and severely humbled. i believe this is why the Lord allowed this to happen, because Peter needed to be humbled and needed to see that he was not strong in himself, that he was not even able to stand strong in the faith without the aid of the Holy Spirit.

Peter denies the Lord, yet Jesus instantly takes him back after the resurrection. Jesus calls a very humbled and ashamed Peter to Himself and tells him to feed His sheep, to follow Him (John 21). Jesus says, " '...when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish.' This He spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God" (John 21:18-19). Peter realized by these words that he would suffer much in his life. Peter wrote 1 and 2 Peter at the end of his life, right before he was crucified, and as you read these letters, you are seeing a completely different man than the young guy that Jesus called to be his disciple - still bold as ever but a man of great meekness who requested to be crucified upside down because of revelation of his own unworthiness to even die the same way Jesus did. The man who starts off his Christian walk thinking he's "the stuff" ends it knowing he is nothing - that Christ is everything, that Christ in him is the only thing that makes him great. He got this revelation not all of a sudden, but slowly, by God's process of chipping away at the areas of his heart that were not Christ-like. Day by day, year by year, God worked in Peter and slowly changed and purified him through suffering and trials to be a man of boldness, as he always was, but also humble, meek, having no confidence in his own strength and no self-righteousness.

Peter's life is such a witness of God's complete ability to transform us and take even our greatest weaknesses and redeem them and turn them into strengths. we want this to happen right away, but God loves processes! And the best part is, He never gives up on us. Let Peter's testimony be an encouragement and assurance to us that if God can change him and call someone like him, with all his issues, he can change any one of us and complete the good work He started.

the truth is, I don't trust God

why is it so hard to trust God?!?! i am frustrated with myself because no matter how many times God comes through for me, every time a new challenge arises, i find myself not trusting! the worst part about it is that the "new challenge" is not new at all, but the same type of situation i just went through 3 months earlier where God came through massively. say finances, for example - a BIG source of stress for missionaries, and an area that, for some reason, is the most difficult to trust God in. when i graduated college, completed my internship at ZHOP, and was entering into living 100% on support, i had 2 weeks to raise enough monthly funding. i was freaking out. i remember crying to a friend on the phone saying, "God called me to full-time ministry, but how am i going to do this, i don't have any funding!" funny part is, i was having this crisis of trust before i had even made a real concerted effort to raise funds. guess what happened? 2 weeks later, i had the money i needed to be a full-time missionary. then i thought, "how stupid of me to doubt the Lord! God, forgive me for my faithlessness."

i thought i learned my lesson, but now i am back in the same boat, in need of finances and stressing out about it. as before, i haven't made a real effort to raise more support, but i'm already anxious. as i am writing this, i am seeing how ridiculous it is to stress before you've even tried. and even more ridiculous, to stress when you are loved by someone like our Lord, who gives to those who ask according to His will. James calls it double-mindedness and instability when a man asks from the Lord and doubts that he shall have it (Jas 1:6).

it really is all on God. if God wants you to do something, He must provide the way, or else you can't do it. the pressure's all on Him! you don't have to do anything but BELIEVE! it is part of our inheritance in Christ to live stress-free. why do we not receive this inheritance? we have the privilege of serving a God who deeply cares and has our best interest in mind (as much as we do not believe that sometimes). let's start acting like it.

p.s. please comment :)

How to use ZHOP TV

This little embedded video I have here (on the right side of the page) is a bunch of audio and video clips from sets at ZHOP, various worship leaders, conferences, and services. To browse, go to "Menu", "Browse On-Demand Library" and select what you would like to listen to.

I'm on it! To find me, do the above and you'll see my name :)

Longsuffering

2 Peter 3:9 says "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance." The context of this verse is the promise of Christ's return, redemption of creation, and destruction of the wicked. I was reading this passage in the Prayer Room and got stuck for a while on this verse. I kept writing and writing about God's longsuffering nature. Longsuffering literally means "to suffer long," or be patient. When we must exercise patience, it implies suffering because we are having to wait for something we badly want right then. What is it that God so badly wants? He wants to marry His Bride and return to earth to dwell with her. This has been His ultimate desire from eternity past. He is consumed with it; it's all He thinks about. What's more, He can have her whenever He wants, for it's His choice when to return. What restrains Him? It's love for those who do not yet know Him, for those who blatantly reject Him, even hate Him. He knows if He were to return now, they would perish and be cast into the lake of fire...and so He waits, to give them ample time to repent and return His love. Even though all creation reveals the glory of God, there is so much evidence of Christ's love, and people hear the Gospel many times and reject him over and over, He still waits, hopes for them to turn. He puts His own desire on hold for the sake of more people coming into the Kingdom. He's willing to suffer long. The laying down of His life, the choosing to cause Himself more pain for another's gain, did not stop at the cross; He does it every second that He does not return.

If you read the book of Revelation and the judgments, God seems mean. There will be famines, wars, massive amounts of people dying. But picture a child abuser, or a human traffiker who rapes children and women, and then think about the fact that the reason Christ has not returned yet is because He is waiting for this wicked person to see the light, that He LOVES even this depraved human being. He wants NONE to perish...that's why He waits. So when He unleashes judgment on the earth, it's because He has waited the absolute maximum amount of time He could and given people ample time and evidence to repent. You see, everything He does is love - the cross, judgment, everything. He's always moving out of a heart of pure, undefiled, crazy love.

content....

my contentment level is unstable and fluctuates a lot....i'm talking about in the area of marriage. i'll go for a few month of being really content, not thinking about it at all, or when i do, just feeling total trust in the Lord in an "i-know-it's-gonna-happen-whether-it's-sooner-or-later-God's-timing-is-the-best-and-amazing" kind of way. then i'll hit despair in this area and cry and say, "God why have you forgotten me?" this sounds dramatic, because i'm 23 years old, and it is :) but it's real human emotion that God cares about and treasures. when i feel the latter, it's usually when things are particularly rough with family and i'm feeling the weight of that - their opposition to Christ and what i do. in these times, i feel very alone because i'm lacking the support of those who are supposed to be that consistent, strong support system in a person's life, and i'm not married. i say, "God, if i'm not gonna have my family, at least let me be married so i would have that as a strength to lean on." i'm completely not satisfied. lately, however, i've been very content. nothing has changed - still the same old battle with parents, still no potential husband around - but i feel good! i received a work from a dear friend at ZHOP, an older man who the Lord has used to speak profoundly into my life, and he told me to not be in a rush to get married and to be patient, to enjoy this time of singleness as a time of being molded into who the Lord wants me to be. i received this and began to see singleness as an opportunity to be whole-heartedly devoted to the Lord without distraction, to run hard after Him and press in to know Him with all my might. and when i feel lonely, my reaction can be to push harder into God. i've decided to see singleness as the only chance i get to single-mindedly and undividedly commune with the Lord. i think God has deliberately hidden me because He wants me for Himself :) ultimately, i want to know Christ and want to say yes to whatever it takes for me to know Him as intimately as i can in this life

....so i'm content to be single...for now. who knows what i'll say 3 months down the road.

Lesson from an Ear Infection

This whole week i have had a real nasty and painful ear infection. It's not completely gone (I still can't hear anything out of my right ear) but most of the pain has subsided, which feels incredible. I was taking antibiotics and about 12 advil a day just to be functional. (It's funny, I've been swimming in oceans, dirty lakes, rock quarries, and pool since I was 7, and I dip my head in 5 times at the community pool and I get the worst ear infection). I'm tellin' you, you don't know how good it is to be pain free until you are in a great amount of pain. In the midst of my agonizing infection, I get a newsletter from Iris Ministries, from Rolland Baker. He writes about his 2 year battle with extreme illness - a nervous breakdown resulting in mental and emotional stress, a nervous tension, memory loss and signs of serious dementia. His whole body was in disrepair and majorly malfunctioning. All this was the result of the extreme stress and pressure of the mission field. Rolland is in recovery now in Germany at a Christian wellness center and is doing much better. But as I read this account, and felt my own unbearable pain, I was struck by the fact that God does not owe us anything. Yes, He wants to and will give us good things - provision, protection, health....But He does not owe it to us. These in no way determine or alter His goodness. He already demonstrated His goodness to the fullest extent possible by sending His Son to the cross, rescuing us from an eternity of misery. By this act alone He proved Himself to be so extremely incomprehensibly good, that if He did absolutely nothing else for us ever again, He would still be fully good, and we wouldn't be able to say otherwise. The fact that He doesn't stop at the salvation of our souls and continues to give us good gifts pushes it way over the top torrential downpour, i-just-wanna-scream HE IS SOOO GOOOOOOODDDDDD!! Though He loves to give gifts, they are just that - gifts, not guarantees, but pleasant surprises.

You would think that God would give someone like Rolland great health all his life, a man who's poured himself out tirelessly for the poor and the orphans. Or at least a miraculous healing, so he wouldn't suffer like this. But Jesus never promised us good health, a good life, a good...anything. In fact, He said the opposite, that the world would hate us. He promised us that He would be with us, and He proved to us that He was worth it. Suffering is part of the road, it's what we sign up for when we say "Yes" to Jesus (maybe you didn't know it, but He said that we must count the cost)...and we keep saying yes through it all because we find Him worth it, that who we have gained (Christ Himself) so far outweighs what we lose, that any price we have to pay does not even come close to how much He is worth.

So I believe God for and expect health, miracles, provision, little tokens of His love (a little boy came up to me, as I'm fighting the ear ache, and gave me a chocolate bar), but I'm not gonna be angry or offended when it may not happen. For even so, He is beautiful, good, worth any and all of it. Let this be your heart cry too...

Photo Captions

From top to bottom:
1) Kelly and me singing on an intercession set
2) & 3) Ryan and baby John praying for Kelly; the anointing is transferring through the sippy cup, haha
4) John playing with the flags in the Prayer Room
5) Sally praying on the mike for a Culture of Life in America
6) Brock family (husband, wife, 4 boys) playing a set; this family is amazing, they faithfully played the 4-6am set 4 days a week!
7) Kelly worshiping (this was staged, she saw me taking the picture :) )
8) & 9) The whole crew! 7 full-timers (+ John) who stood in prayer between midnight-6am every night! We're pointing to the board on which is written who leads what sets, and we're excited because for the last week, we filled all the slot. So we had live music in the Night all week, no CDs! (this hadn't happened in a while).