I love how thorough God truly is.  I don’t know why I am continuously inspired by this fact, but I am.  There are some things in life I’m rather thorough about, but for the most part, I leave the little details for my wife who thrives on them.  In the work setting I have always left these details to my secretary or someone in the working team who simply found these as their gift–it is not mine.  So, when I see God’s detail coming out, I am always impressed and amazed.

Yesterday I wrote about God awakening in me the need for me to bless my dad along with forgiving him.  The forgiving part I’d done many years ago.  I was telling this to my share group last night during the last hour of our Celebrate Recovery.  At the end of the hour when we had closed the group, one of the men told me that he just didn’t understand why I was feeling convicted about blessing my dad.  He told me he had read my book twice and he said there were a number of times I had given dad compliments as well as what he’d call–blessings.  I knew he was right about my giving credible attention to dad’s strengths when I wrote the book, but my need to give dad a blessing was a heart issue, not an action issue.  This came out for me when I had my devotions this morning.  I was journaling about this very thing.  God made it clear that when I wrote the book 1.5 years ago I had put the balancing side of dad in it.  I knew I needed to tell a complete picture of him and so I did it out of obedience.  God wanted me doing it from my heart.  That is where true forgiveness come from and it completes forgiveness.  Today I see this clearly.

I found it really insightful that to a reader of my book I had fully forgiven dad and the blessing side of forgiveness was there.  But the detail of forgiveness only God knows and my younger brother felt wasn’t complete.  God knew my heart and Ron felt it.  Today, those are now in congruence and I am a freer man.  This is the thoroughness of detail I was referencing about our magnificent God.  He leaves no stone unturned when He is completing His work in our lives.  I love Him for this even though it has some uncomfortable moments.  The other side of those moments is so freeing.  Thank You Father.

My Bible reading this morning hit upon a topic I have needed to address for a while.  Somehow, God knew today is the day for driving home a biblical point I have been overlooking.  It comes from Luke 6:27-28.  In verse 27 Jesus is telling the crowd that we are to “love our enemies and those who hurt you”.  In verse 28 He goes on to say that along with loving them, we are to bless these same people.  What hit me this morning was brought to the surface when I gave my testimony (story) to the church last Sunday night.  In my testimony I tell a great deal about the hurt and abuse of my past from dad.  I tell how I was able to say, “I love you” to his body when I was called to say he had passed away.  I’d gone to the nursing home where his body lay until the funeral home arrived to remove it.  I hurried over so I could talk to dad.  However, I have never, ever, tried to give blessing to dad.  Up until this very moment I think I’d have politely walked away from anyone who might have suggested such a thing.

Last summer my younger brother told me it troubles him having dad’s name slurred by my book and my testimony.  After all, he is our dad and there was some good about him he’d say.  I took that as Ron’s problem, not mine.  Since then I’ve had numerous occasions where God has brought that message up to me when I’m counseling someone or giving my testimony.  This morning God brought the message home.  God does want me to bless my dad.  It is the fullness of forgiveness.  My dad has been gone for well over 10 years now so my first thought was that it’s too late.  However, in asking God how I’d handle this He simply said I need to balance my remarks about dad by adding what is good about him.  As I was journaling this morning I listed the things I liked about dad.  The thing I liked the most was when he’d come to our bed early in the morning when he was trying to decide something.  He’d always say, “Earn or (Dern-a nickname), are you awake?”  After that he’d go on to tell what he was considering or pondering and ask what I thought about it.  He’d usually include Ron in this too as we always slept together.  As a teen these moments made me feel like I was important to him.  I always liked the fact that dad had a compulsive side  that was fun.  When we would be planning to go to California for Christmas, he’d up and decide we will leave right now.  Everyone would have to pack in a couple hours notice and off we’d go.  That was FUN.

As I treasure these moments I can thank dad for these things about him.  In fact, it is heart-warming just to write them out like this.  My dad did do some awful things as a parent but just as Celebrate Recovery teaching me, these awful things in our lives are not our identity, they are our struggle.  These things about my dad were his struggle.  I do not want to make someone think that was his identity.  God had a whole different identity for him just as He does for me.

As I am having my bible reading each morning I am seeing more and more relationship between myself and those listening to Jesus.  This morning in Luke Jesus was teaching to those in his hometown.  The Pharisees were questioning him because he was “Joseph’s son”–a common man who was a simple carpenter.  Had they forgotten about Jesus’ birth and the host of angels as well as the wise men coming, and all of that?  It had only been 30 years.  Regardless, the scriptures said they tried to reason with Christ’s actions and they were going to throw him over the ledge to his death.  Just a week or so ago I found myself trying to reason through several things and I found that fear was the motivator for “reasoning”.  I wasn’t taking by faith what was in front of me.  I am also learning that once I take the step of faith, I can’t then try to reason my way through the tasks, assignments in front of me.  I need to complete the tasks only how God gives them to me.  I can see I want to control the outcome rather than let the outcome be God’s.  Little by little I am seeing just how much I need to let go and accept each day in faith.

Christ told the Pharisees that a prophet cannot do much work in his hometown because of the very reasons He can’t do much work with us if we try to stay in control.  I see this more and more clearly as I grow in Him.  This morning I told God I am sorry for acting on this character defect and to please help me replace it with genuine trust in Him that plays itself out with the decisions I make in starting my day and living throughout the day.  When this journey does come to an end I don’t want to hear, “I could do little with you because you wanted to keep the reigns in your hands rather than placing them in mine.”  I want to remember that this Jesus who was born to Joseph, the carpenter; who the angels literally came in celebration; who the wise men came to honor; is the very Son of God.  I can and will trust Him and place all my faith in him one day at a time and one moment at a time throughout each day.

Yesterday I outlined all the activities which were to be part of the day.  It all took place just as planned.  The amazing part was actually being present in each of them.  God is so good to slow down my anxious mind so I can simply take each thing before me and live in His abundance in it.  The only part of the day that needed my leadership was the Celebrate Recovery meeting.  Even that was an off and on revival meeting where lives were fed, touched and blessed as well as given direction about moving forward with the ministry.  Last night I gave my testimony to a church’s congregation.  Even though I was nervous, I was far more at peace than I ever have been yet doing this.  I have carried within me this awful character defect that being up front no matter the reason was arrogance.  I never transposed this judgment to anyone else, it was just me.  I know it was dad’s hounding as a child & teenager.  Because of the most current situations and awakenings I am seeing the difference between being “bold” for Christ’s Kingdom work and being arrogant.  I’m so glad my worship pastor made that comment to me last Thursday in practice.  That piece of knowledge led to God’s Light piercing that character defect and replacing it with the knowledge God has always wanted me to know and have.  I am so much freer to move forward being up front for God’s Kingdom work.

As I began to journal this morning I was starting to race through all that “might” be taking place today.  It was something like starting my day in my “old self”.   But, God told me to listen to my spirit.  My spirit was at peace and it was calm.  Let my spirit speak to my mind knowing all the actual activities of the day will take place and I can face each of them with the calm assurance that God is in control when I surrender the anxiety of my mind.  I instantly did this and now I’m ready to go to my school district as well as deal with the rest of the day’s Godly assignments.  I’m living in my new creation.  God is truly amazing and I’m so grateful for His loving patience with me.

Today’s journey has an abundance of activity in it.  It starts very typically with choir, church service, and then a step study for Celebrate Recovery.  After church there is a CR leadership monthly meeting and then I’m either to practice with our quartet for 2 upcoming events or meet with one of the CR men.  At 6:00 I give my testimony at a church in Nampa.  The interesting thing about this is today’s step study lesson is ACTION.  This is the new step study for those who have been in leadership for a while.  It asks questions about the “whys” we are doing what we are doing?  Are we trying to be in control or allowing ourselves to be fully committed to God’s leadership and how do we know the difference?  Well, I am in the midst of trying to work through all of these questions in my daily living.  I do know I am learning the difference between responding to my will vs The Holy Spirit.  When the Holy Spirit is in control I am not, I am obedient and leaving control out of my hands.  This is a tough item for me in many circumstances but little by little I am making progress.

I find it fascinating that most of my life I did lots of the same activities I do today.  The difference is that I did them to keep people from seeing my past.  Now I do them so people can know my past and hopefully see that they don’t need to keep secrets either.  I never knew in those earlier days how selfish my actions were–trying to keep others’ eyes on activity and not me. Man is sure a selfish being and I am right in the midst of my own learning about this. This is a huge item of freedom that requires a lot of humility to see the truth of it.  I want to stay here the rest of my life.  To God be the Glory!

This journey of walking as God’s new creation is truly amazing.  I wrote yesterday about the statement my worship pastor had said to me about “the humble man I am”.  The confusion I had about this was truly tied to a false belief that singing was arrogance for me.  I have always tried my best to not stand out while singing but let the song and its message be what stands out.  Being confident in delivery of a song doesn’t mean being arrogant I realizing.  The message of my childhood has finally being overcome.  This morning I feel freer than I ever have.  This message isn’t just true about singing but it is true about me doing whatever God wants me to do for Him.  I’ve lived under this stigma all my life.  I feel freer to simply step into an assignment without the burden of my past screaming at me.  I don’t know if this makes sense to anyone, but it is no less than a miracle for me.  Thank you God and Carol.

I was able yesterday to get a major application completed for an outfit that will consider the young man I spoke about.  I know their CFO well and text him that the app is submitted.  He is going to take it from there.  I’d sure love to see this man have a chance in our world and mostly to let him know how much our loving Father loves him.  If this is one way God wants to show this, I pray it will happen.

Today is the wedding day for a young man and his bride to be.  This young man came to our Celebrate Recovery about 3 years ago.  He was one of the most meek, humble, timid young men I’ve ever met.  He had some hurts, hang-ups and habits which complicated even more his belief about himself.  He wanted someday to be worthy of a bride but knew that would never happen.  Well, today is God’s miracle for him.  I just smile and feel warm all over as I write this.  He is a genuine example of God’s work in our lives when we finally take a risk and take that first step of faith.  I love it!

This day, Father God, be glorified.  This is my intent for each day I live.  Up until most currently, this was my mask, my camouflage.  Now, it is reason for living–no longer to hide who I am, but to live out my purpose in being a child of the King.

Yesterday morning I was asked to come to the church for a few minutes by our worship pastor.  I have a piece in our upcoming Christmas program singing O Holy Night.  The program setting is Christmas time during World War II.  She wanted to help me understand this in how the song would be nestled into all the drama of the program.  During this time she made a statement I didn’t understand until this morning.  She told me I needed to not sing this as the humble man I am, but as a confident, well-known, admired singer that I was during this era.  I reran that line–“the humble man I am” through my head all day yesterday.  I had never, ever thought about me being a humble man when singing.  It was singing that gave me the most grief with dad and what he called my pride and arrogance.  Dad would rip me apart after big singing engagements or competitions telling me I was nothing but arrogant and no good to this family anymore.  Carol’s statement to me yesterday caused me to bring the person I am into the action of singing a song.  I had always just prayed I’d be a good servant of God and sing His songs to honor Him.  This morning I have begun to realize that I am a child of the King who sings.  When I sing I want to glorify God confidently.  Wow, that seems puzzling and yet freeing.  God is awakening a reality He wants me to know in this.

In just an hour I’m meeting with a young man who just got out of prison after serving 8 years for drug stuff.  He’s trying to find work and is unable.  He wants to stay clean and live right but he isn’t finding a starting place for supporting himself.  I’m praying God will open that door.  He is only 26 years old.  Please join me in prayer that God will glorify Himself this day for this young man and that this young man will see and meet a Glorious God.

When we need to know if something is genuine, we first must know what genuine actually is.  On July 31 I began journaling to God my Father rather than to Jesus.  This was a big step for me and it has led me down a path of tremendous challenge learning to know my Father as a loving Dad as well as the Creator of the Universe.  He Himself is the One who gave me His Son Jesus to pave my way to Eternity once and for all.  At the end of September this walk had me coming to a fundamental reality that I not only am a new creation, but I live each day as one.  All of this has been rather ethereal–lacking material substance for me.  I had to live here for a while in order for the substance of this reality to begin to set in.

It is now close to 3.5 months that I’ve been journaling daily to God and this process has not only become comfortable, but I love our time together each day.  Now let me get into the substance side of this.  A week ago yesterday Kathy and I got back from China about midnight.  The next morning I went to the school district to meet with the administrator I was temporarily replacing.  I hadn’t had but a few hours of sleep which was now building into the 40+ hours range.  As I got home from the district I desperately needing to sleep and I couldn’t.  My body was steeped in time change adjustment. I found myself being severely tempted to step into a pattern of sinful behavior that was a common practice when I felt lost, weary and confused in my old self.  I began to go there and finally got myself out of it but never did get any sleep.  I hadn’t been to Celebrate Recovery for 2 weeks nor to the Conquer group for the same amount of time.  It was my first day back home and all the tools I’d learned to take at these times were seemingly lost someplace.

It is now a week later.  I have kept all of this within me wondering what I do with it.  Yesterday morning God told me I needed to talk to my accountability about it just like the tools I’d learned said to do.  He said the clarity would follow this step.  So, last night at Celebrate Recovery I talked to the two men I needed to see and completed this step.  Now it is the morning following obedience.  When I was asking God what He wanted me to know today, this is what I heard Him say, “You’ve just experienced My Team at work.  The Spirit of Truth has brought about the clarity.  You took the steps and now the door of clarity is open–you no longer see the sin–you see fertile land.  Unconfessed sin is a wall that entraps you.  Satan hammers you inside it.  Face the mountain and take the steps from the tools I provided and the walls come down.  You again see the fertile land–my people waiting for interaction with you.”

The remarkable thing about all this for me has been experiencing all of this as a new creation rather than as an old man still trying to hide the behaviors I’d learned from living a life of hiding a past I wanted to keep buried.  This time I now realize my desire to keep this a secret is simply my pride.  I am a new creation, but I still battle with being me.  This experience has been such a great learning one for me.  I’m certainly not happy that I failed for a moment, but to see myself as a child of God rather than that sinful, abused self is a real awakening.  I’m sorry I have to confess this to you, but I am not sorry for the lesson God is teaching me from it.  The walls of sin are gone and I see a world of fertile soil–men waiting to know this loving Father of ours.  So, if telling this helps even one of them to know God loves you, I will tell it from the mountain top.

In my 3.5 months of journaling to God my Father, I am developing a trust I’ve not had in Him.  This is the genuineness I was talking about at the start of today’s blog.  My experience has been the substance to show me what this is all about.  This Father of ours is a most Loving, Forgiving, Caring One.  He’s proved it over and over again.  How much I love Him!

My word, our country did something yesterday I don’t believe any other country could or would do–elect a redefinition of who we are.  I’m so proud of America for seeing our need to do this.  I wait in wonder and fervent prayer that in this redefinition we place God, Our Heavenly Father, back on His rightful throne for our country.  The separation of church and state which our forefathers created for America never intended it to look like it has been presently defined.  God is giving us a new chance to make Him great again by our re-establishment Him in our leadership of man.  Pray with me that our newly established team will see this as a paramount first in their work.

On a personal note now, I have been reconnecting with my support groups after being gone the past couple weeks on the China trip.  This has been awfully good for me.  While I was in China I was somehow in a different state of mind where the old Satan attacks didn’t even happen.  I was caught up in enjoying all I was experiencing and learning.  Coming back however, my humanness looms to the front and I find myself needing the support of my support groups.  One of the things from last night that truly stood out in our Conquer series was the fact that we can’t overcome our addictive behaviors in isolation.  That’s an old man’s thinking.  The new creation knows I must keep myself in connection to human support for God’s great healing in part comes through our “telling/sharing” our truth with others.  God is so faithful and I want to be a good and faithful servant.

Praise the Lord for His Mercy.

I found it interesting this morning of election day that my devotional title was “Facing Life’s Mountains”.  I have always been a huge supporter of our country’s political system in light of the rest of our world.  But, I haven’t lived through such a hateful, divisive six-twelve months as these have been.  I purposely have not addressed any of this in my blog because my blog’s purpose has always been my life’s journey from the darkness of my past into the light of my being a new creation–an heir of God as I say in my book.

So, why am I doing it now on election day?  It’s because today is the first election day I’ve lived where I know and breathe as a new creation of God.  Thus, it has been different for me as I’ve witnessed what we all have in this raucous campaign.  I don’t think either of our major choices lives a life committed to God but it is not difficult to see which one better supports God’s Kingdom work by surrounding themselves with committed Christians.  As I was praying this morning while having my devotions I prayed for God’s fullness to be made know this day.  He reminded me that His gift to man in His first creation was choice.  Either way this election goes, He will ultimately bring this world to its intended end.  What we do with our portion of time is in our hands of choice.

I sincerely pray that God will be seen today as the One recognized for the outcome of this election.  So, be sure and use the gift God gave to us all–choice.  This is one thing that our country has not moved away from in how it recognizes man.  Most of our world’s other countries dishonor their people with their election times.   God be glorified today!