Occasionally, someone will ask me: historically, where do you think we are? There’s no exact answer to that as no one possesses the timetable of God. I do believe in scriptural seasons. And, there’s a super argument for this being ‘the season’ that’s been prophesied and anticipated for thousands of years. (One thing I do know is it’s my and your last generation so we can live it with that in mind each day.) For me personally, knowing the exact moment is not what stabilizes my daily Christian walk. What does cause me to stand firm is a simple expression found in Luke 21:9 (paraphrased) ‘Don’t panic or give into fear, these thing are bound to happen, but the end is not immediate.’ I’m not always watching or using what I’m seeing as a calculator of what is real in our big picture called Faith. Example, what did it look like when our King rode into Jerusalem on a donkey to be killed? It wasn’t going well for his band of believers at that moment. It looked like Jesus’ message was done, cut off, finished. Roman rule then was very similar to rulers in the world now; then and now, not very comforting times for the Christian faithful. Back then their world was characterized by the humiliation of Jesus. Roman rule guarded against suspicions and required guards at the tomb to guarantee no shenanigans. At that time, His followers were considered terrorists by the Romans. And the embalming, the tomb, and Jesus’ criminal public death married stress and doubt. For many reasons it looked to be the worst of seasons for believers. The humiliation of Jesus continues today.

One of the whimsical expressions I’ve used before in these letters is one a friend stated to me over 40 years ago, ‘You can’t snow the snowman.’ It stuck in my mind years ago and it’s a phrase that plays a big role in my life today. I think that’s the case because he followed with this statement: ‘Because He knows all about snow.’ In a worldly sense – you can fool folks, camouflage the realities of the world system, but in the long run, you can’t snow the Creator of the world. God is not in Heaven pacing the floor, rubbing His hands together in uncertainty, He is confident, He’s sitting; a pose that translates He is at Peace. He is not distressed; He knows the future and very importantly, how to bring it about. He knows much more than what may be being expressed in front of our eyes. We have a tendency to focus on the magician on the world stage and look amazed. He knows the magician’s tricks and He’s not impressed.

I think my personal stability about ‘today’ is expressed pretty well in Psalm 2. (It was written around 1044 B.C.) It’s not necessary that this prophecy be about today specifically, however it does express the behind the curtain reality of God’s certainty very well.

‘The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break God’s bands asunder, and cast away God’s cords from us.
He that sits in the heavens shall laugh (I think defined in this case, mock or scorn): the Lord shall have them in derision (in the original language, have them speaking unintelligently, stammering).’

Eugene Peterson in his The Message Bible paraphrases it like this: ‘Why the big noise, nations? Why the mean plots, peoples? Earth-leaders push for position, demagogues and delegates meet for summit talks, the God-deniers, the Messiah-defiers: “Let’s get free of God! Cast loose from Messiah. Heaven-throned God breaks out laughing. At first He’s amused at their presumption…’ Psalm 2 is as relevant today as the day it was written 3000 years ago. In Jesus’ time the Roman Empire ruled, had dreams of world domination; today that empire is gone. Personally, I have no delusions about how this will all turn out. We are to follow scripture: ‘do not embrace worry.’ That’s not to say I don’t see the obvious, the drama being played out before my eyes. I just know that behind the curtain of the world stage is God in Heaven that observes the kings of the earth and their counseling and scheming to cast God away. The world plots, snickers, glees in its self-centeredness, boasts in its hatefulness. Doing that, it has the same assured results as before: chaos and curse. You just can’t snow the snowman. Many times I know we don’t act like it but God is present everywhere. He holds all things together; if He was not present, it would fly apart and be destroyed (Col. 1:15-17). It would be as void as Genesis 1:1

Maybe we’ll correct the wrongs of today or perhaps we will not. One thing we do know, God, in every generation of men has, and always will, accomplish His purpose no matter what it looks like. My overwhelming confidence is in Him doing that today as well. Luke 21 is a pretty earth crushing picture of someone’s culture. Some attribute it to referencing Jerusalem’s fall in 70 AD and others stamp it on today. I do think that the latter part of that scripture describes the past but likely whispers of a future manifestation of Messiah.

Some folks mention, why so positive in your BVN letters in the middle of such a negative moment in our country and in the world? Again, the letters here are about Gospel/New Life living and not a cultural statement. Plenty can be written about and should be done on the subject of our culture and norms. The subjects of our education system and media might take a few hundred pages to address in themselves. As for me, I think the media is the most guilty, empowering evil as good and good as evil. They’re enabling things that we might normally reject, making them the norm.

That said, WBVN’s thirty-two year journey has been to center in on Christ, to share His love and to focus on the Gospel. There are many great speakers and writers better at discussions about the cultural experience that we’re all having in these unique times. I mentioned at a recent concert, WBVN didn’t come to be successful, it came to share Hope. Seeing all that’s going on in the earth, being aware of its catastrophic effect on our lives, and most importantly our children’s lives, doesn’t pull our focus to the magician standing on the stage. We continue to look backstage to the Director of Grace and trust in Him.

I had a conversation recently with my friend Mike Middleton. The subject was how many faithful, having to deal so much of the worldly systems, are just simply fatigued. However, we should remember there are many believers still confident. There’s a different reality to those that choose Him. I always enjoyed reading the following quote from author George McDonald. It settles me down, gives confidence in the Heart of God and it re-establishes the embrace that I understand each and every day from the God of the Cosmos.

‘Nearly all of them (theologians) represent him as a great King on a grand throne, thinking how grand he is, and making it the business of his being and the end of his universe to keep up his glory, wielding the bolts of a Jupiter against them that take his name in vain. They would not allow this, but follow out what they say, and it comes much to this. Brothers, have you found our king? There he is, kissing little children and saying they are like God. There he is at table with the head of a fisherman lying on his bosom, and somewhat heavy at heart that even he, the beloved disciple, cannot yet understand him well. The simplest peasant who loves his children and his sheep were… a true type of our God beside that monstrosity of a monarch.’ (George MacDonald from “The Child In The Midst” in Unspoken Sermons)

That God, His Gospel, is that personal, that caring, that present, right here, right now.

In my previous newsletters I’ve emphasized how the Spirit of God is inside believers. I would also suggest, many times believers live like they question that a bit. We can easily assume that God must be called into our lives from far away in order to enter into our particular world or circumstances. Over the 30 plus years I’ve written these letters, if I had to pick out one theme that overlaid almost everything I say in them, it’s ‘God is with us’– not in another dimension. He doesn’t have to be whistled into ours. When Adam and Eve failed, the result was they lost their knowledge of Grace of God, of His Love. What was initially a wonderful grace experience between them and God became suspicious in their minds. Wandering around life without that Grace knowledge became mankind’s universal curse. Post-Eden searching for that specific knowledge is the journey each person is required to walk. However, God never gives up on us discovering He’s Love. God sent prophets, priests and kings and He placed evidence of Himself in the creation so that we might find Him. His desire is that all men find that knowledge of Grace. How else do you explain that the Creator of the cosmos sent His Son to be brutalized and killed and then sent The Comforter to stay in each believer’s heart. That’s pretty personal, pretty one on one.

While thinking about that Grace, and being aware of the Peace it brings, I was thinking about how that knowledge fits into our today, and especially into our tomorrow. The changes we see in our community, our culture and actually the whole world, create a tension between our Christ filled hearts, what we hope for and dream of, and the world systems. Believers’ hearts naturally oppose what we are seeing and hearing many times. In scripture, we’re encouraged to become as children about the Gospel because children actually, usually only see reality. Jesus himself, the wisest of all men, encouraged us to become such as that. Unfortunately, as children grow older they typically change into looking at the world as adults express it. Truth is, the Gospel is reality; the world’s system is sleight of hand, offering much it cannot deliver.

After walking around the earth for a few decades, I’m aware of the responsibility of Christians to be ‘salt of the earth’. We’re to be a shining light in a dark place, doing so by reflecting His radiance and not our own. We’re to share the Gospel and create a place for its expression to be life changing for others. Believers are to bring Hope where there is no Hope. That’s one of the purposes of the Church in the earth. Today and tomorrow, if the fields are really white for harvest, believers have a great opportunity to share the Love of God. Ours is to not match hate for hate, but bring Hope and Good News. The introduction of chaos, confusion, anxiety and rebellion takes its toll on all of us, both the ones creating it and the ones having to observe it. I once heard it said that our lives will be significantly different if we don’t simply evaluate it by what we see but more by how we see it. A world view in competition with the heart of God might be another way to say it. Christ in us is why believers have the ability to Hope in times like these. We are not to be overwhelmed by the world but have a confidence that Christ within us makes it possible to overcome a world of trouble. In the midst of that, we can Rest and, as I mentioned in a previous letter, pray. Author Eugene Peterson once wrote that ‘waiting in prayer is the disciplined refusal to act before God acts.’ Isaiah 40:31 says, ‘They that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.’ You and I have heard that many times and each time I read it I’m reminded that to ‘wait upon’ in the original text refers to braiding (similar to a rope) ourselves with God. That word implies God adds and strengthens when we join with Him, in this case, in prayer. It’s interesting to notice that when Jesus was told of Lazarus’ death, he waited two more days before going to the site. Confidence in what the Father was doing might have created that response. With the pace of this world, waiting can be pretty tough and pretty out of step with what’s going on around us. However, if we look at the life of Jesus, instead of just simply showing up as adult Jesus and walking into Jerusalem and in a just a few hours permitting the leaders to crucify him, problem solved, Jesus actually waited until he saw what the Father was doing. It took 33 years to accomplish his purpose. For all those years, Jesus waited, trusted and believed.

It’s interesting to look back and see the similarity of the early scripture of the Old Testament and the New. Adam and Eve failed to believe God and the apple became a problem. Abraham did believe and it was counted unto him as righteousness. (Gen 15) Moses followed and led the Hebrews out of Egypt because he believed. Later he would not enter into the Promised Land because he and they doubted God’s promise to go in. Today, and tomorrow, we face that same kind of moment. Do we trust, do we hold steadfast because of the witness in our hearts, or get captured by the world system through their manipulation of our mind and imagination?

One of the things I have grown patient with over the years is not measuring the ‘ways of God’ by what’s going on around me. ‘Judge nothing before its time’ has been a catch phrase for me over the years. In reality, I can only get into a Peaceful place by having a perspective of what’s happening in God’s ‘cosmos’. What is going on in His Kingdom is not the same as what we see and hear, here. When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, which had never been done before, no past experiences of that existed. Yet, Jesus did what is real in his world of influence right in the middle of our world of crisis. What we have seen and heard, sickness and war, for the past few years creates fear, division and some very hateful environments. I still have a confidence that as in the Lord’s Prayer (Mathew 6:1) someday ‘Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven’ will come to pass. Even as the world’s anti-Lord’s prayers manifest themselves, God’s dream for the earth is still active and true, no matter what we see and hear. The ‘birth pangs’ we currently see and hear are not unreal; they’re actually described in scripture, but they will eventually be destroyed. The Promise of the whole Word of God is that He is advancing toward a re-model; we’re on the road to that happening in some tomorrow. I’m reminded of a quote I heard years ago, ‘Prophecy is a history of the future.’ That’s interesting to think about, considering prophesies we’ve been given for our future. This is our bottom line. There is a voice that might be quiet and subtle but is louder than all the other voices we hear here on earth- the voice of the Father, Son and the Spirit speak and overshadow all other voices.

God is with us. We are not in this alone, we’re not ‘heavy lifting’ it all by ourselves. Ephesians 2:22 reminds us of the Spirit’s habitation, literally dwelling place, in believers’ hearts. With all the distractions, terror, fear, and aggressiveness we still can have Peace dwelling in our hearts because the Spirit of God lives there. Our task is to tap into that, let it dominate our daily lives; pause long enough to consider it. You can’t outlaw ‘indwelling’. I had minor surgery years ago and the doctor didn’t use stitches on the wound; his explanation was that with physical wounds such as that, they heal from the inside outward. The Spirit of Christ heals the same way; He’s in our hearts. That’s where our true healing comes from.

Andrew Peterson came out with a song we’ve rotated for about 3 years now: Is He Worthy? Andrew’s answer is ‘He Is’. It’s a reference back to the Book of Revelation. That question can find a place in our hearts to where we constantly answer, ‘He is’. As such He is worthy of our awe, our praise, our affection and worthy of our trust. Today and tomorrow, He is with us, does not forsake us, does not abandon or give up on His vision of our future. I often remember how Paul, in his writing prior to crucifixion referred to our Savior as Jesus Christ. After resurrection, Paul referred to him as Christ Jesus. Each was appropriate because Jesus Christ represents what man could do through God. Christ Jesus represents what God could do through man. That’s a nice gift package for us.