Many exhortations we hear within the church are things we should be doing. Things like evangelizing, teaching, praying, serving, giving, studying and so on. Good things, I agree. The Bible does encourage us to do these things, but have we ever stopped to think about the fact that this is a masculine viewpoint of the Gospel? God created the masculine to go, to create, to conquer, to build, to produce. And often this is the side we see revealed in our churches. That’s great, but where’s the feminine side?

Simplified, the masculine is to do; the feminine is to be. A father speaks vision and destiny to a child. He reveals all the possibilities of what can be done, what can be accomplished. A mother expresses love and nurture to a child. She exhibits compassion, trust and connection. Picture this: a father and mother are watching their four-year-old son play soccer. He’s so cute out there running around in his bright uniform and shin guards on. The father yells, “Get the ball! Go to the goal! Shoot!” The little guy runs hard, dribbles as best he can towards the net and shoots. Just as he kicked the ball, an opposing team member tried to kick it too but missed and landed his cleat squarely on the knee of the little fellow. The ball makes it into the net, but the son is on the ground holding his hurt knee. Now what are the reactions from the parents in this event? From the father: “GOAL! Yes! My son made a goal! Look at him, he’s the greatest! Think he’s good now? Just wait till he’s ten!” And from the mother: “Oh honey, are you okay? (wanting to run out onto the field and check for herself) Can you get up? Are you bleeding? Do you need a band-aid?” Notice the difference in the two. This type of “mothering” is an expression of God’s heart.

And think about it: How can we truly carry out the Great Commision (“go ye into all the world”) if we first cannot obey the Great Commandment (“thou shalt love the Lord God with all your heart…”)? Love is always first. Before we go, we need to know love. We need to be “mothered” by God, nurtured in His care and secure in His affections towards us. Knowing His immeasurable grace gives us the base to stay in a place of rest and peace as we go into the world to do His works and share His love to others.

God’s mothering heart is open to us all. John, the beloved disciple, recognized this side of the Lord when he rested on Jesus’ chest at supper (John 21:20). It’s the place we find refuge, safety, security, compassion and peace. Just like a mother, He’s there to hold us when we’re scared, kiss our boo-boos, and walk hand in hand with us through all of life’s challenges. I pray that you will take time to rest in the arms of our Beloved. Stop “doing” for a little while and just “be.” When the world tries to beat you down and you don’t feel like you will ever make a goal or be a success, God has a mothering heart that wants to nurture you back to strength, and lavish perfect love on you.

Almost every Saturday morning I pass by a fellow who exercises regularly like me. And it seems like to everyone he walks by he says, “How ya feeling this morning? Feeling good? Alright. It’s gonna be a great day.” He’s truly is one of the most positive persons I’ve ever met, even though I haven’t exactly ever “met” him. He carries with him an atmosphere of optimism, of joy and goodness. I don’t know if he’s a believer in Christ, but I suspect he is.

A feeling of acceptance and inclusion is what this man shares – a real living example of Father’s love – and what occurs to me is that the only way he can spread this feeling around is by knowing it himself. I believe we can’t give away something we don’t have.

In order for us to make others feel accepted and included, we must feel that way ourselves. Just like trying to sell a product you don’t believe in, buyers can see right through your pitch and know it’s not good, or else you’d be using it too. This works through the principle of loving your neighbor as you love yourself (Matt.22:39). The foundation is first knowing you are loved and accepted unconditionally by Father God. When we understand this and can love ourselves – having mercy on our own faults, mistakes and failures – we can then, in turn, risk loving others with all their faults and problems.

This is the test. Are we able to risk loving? Are we able to hold our heart open? Are we able to give, knowing that we may be rejected, ignored, made fun of, or even despised in return? Many times our own pain keep us from opening up our hearts – we’ve been hurt before, so what makes us think this time will be any different? This insecurity only goes away when we fully receive His love and deal with our wounding.

Jesus was so secure in His Father’s love that He could endure the ridicule, the humiliation, and the judgement of others, even to the point of never retaliating or defending Himself. He was grounded in love. He always walked in optimism and joy.

So when I pass my Saturday-morning encourager, cheering on and lifting up those around him, this fellow reminds me of Jesus. And I feel happier. I feel included in the human race and accepted to just be me. The atmosphere around me has been charged with kindness and I can’t help but smile. Now it’s my turn to share it. Am I secure enough to give it away?

Picture two nine year old boys staring out the window of an orphanage longing for simple things. A family to be with on Christmas morning, the taste of warm cookies and milk after school. God put a deep longing in us for loving family. Closeness with God is founded in being a son comfortable with his father. Living as fatherless leaves us languid, without an inheritance, without emotional resources and opportunities that only fathers can give. How do we learn sonship?

Was dad there with acceptance and comforting love when I gave it my all but still struck out and my teammates sneered and scoffed? Did he rejoice with me when I worked hard and aced my final exam? When I wrecked the car and dad was upset, did I still know he was safe? Was dad’s love and authority a safe and warm place for my heart to rest?

Many of us had parents in the home, but their emotional absence or abuse left us feeling like orphans. Walking with God is about embracing a posture of sonship. It is more than loyalty and obedience, it is a heart responding to love, crying out, “Abba Father.” However, if you didn’t learn this growing up, how do you get there?

Daniel LaRusso grew up without a father. High school age, he moved from New Jersey to Los Angeles and promptly found himself being picked on. Enter Mr. Miyagi. He knew how to father, how to believe in someone who doesn’t believe in themselves. He knew how to see potential in Daniel and draw it out of him. Daniel gained the ability to risk because Miyagi gave him the fathering presence that was a sure emotional foundation to risk from. Daniel was able to risk fighting the Cobra Kai martial arts team, facing potential harm, with no guarantee of success. Many of you know this as the Karate Kid story, but the truth is, we all long for a spiritual father to believe in us.

To grow as a son you have to be willing to open your heart to a father. He won’t be perfect, he may not fit your perception of how a father does things, but he’ll change your life if you let him. Mr. Miyagi taught Daniel to be teachable, taught him to work hard and not ask questions. Daniel had to take on the posture of a son if he wanted the inheritance Miyagi offered.

Romans 8:14 says we have to be led (teachable) in order to be sons. Verse 15 says that by being led, the Spirit frees us of the fears that come from living in independence, fear of having to fend for ourselves because we can’t let a father be there for us. God gives us adoption to sonship wherein we cry Abba (Daddy) Father. Hebrews 12:8, 9 says it this way: if we can’t receive correction from Father, we are as illegitimate sons. No father equals no inheritance. Verse 9, If we can receive correction, we LIVE. God’s life flows through us. Back to Romans 8, verse 17 confirms this that when we live led, we get inheritance, we are heirs with Christ. We mature into what God has for us and make a difference in the world in the unique way God created us for.

1 John 4:20 says we don’t have in the spiritual what is not seen in the natural. In other words, if I have a heart of sonship toward God, you will see evidence of that in how I relate to spiritual fathers and authority figures, on earth. It starts with opening my heart, taking on the posture of a son. God has some Cobra Kai for you to fight. Will you take the risk?

We live in a world that values strength and belittles weakness. We idolize characters such as Rambo, John Wayne, and Jason Bourne. It is so easy to feel that there is no way to advance in life if people see our weaknesses, our personal struggles. So we tend to be drawn toward hiding these things about ourselves. We want to put them in the dark where no one can see them. Yet, if we can’t even acknowledge we have struggles, how can we ever hope to overcome them? Understanding what is darkness and what is light puts a huge tool in our hands for growth.

Blatant sin, of course, is darkness; however, there can be smaller, less noticeable ways where we might be living in the dark. 1 John 1:6 says,”… if we say we have fellowship with God, but we continue living in darkness, we lie and do not follow the truth.” So what exactly does this “living in darkness” mean? Simply put, anything that is hidden and not exposed. To paraphrase Andrew Murray’s definition of humility, darkness is not being willing to be known for who we really are.

If we are humble – being known for who we really are – then we find no reason to hide our past, our present struggles, or our future dreams. But being open and transparent like this involves risk. If we were to divulge certain things about ourselves, people may reject us or make fun of us, or even worse, they may not love and accept us. And it’s possible they may abandon us.

It’s much easier to stay in the dark than to take the chance of living in openness and transparency, but unfortunately, there are “friends” that tend to hang around us there. Fear, worry, anxiety, shame, guilt – all of these can be our ‘best friends’ when we’re in darkness. And there’s no peace or rest there. Only by embracing light do we position ourselves to experience growth.

We can be free from our past and live emotionally present in all our relationships today! By facing the hidden darkness in our lives, we can find freedom to be who we really are, unashamedly. Light is the place where we have the actual experience of feeling secure in our Father’s arms and live open-hearted to the world.

Stillness. Stillness in mind, body and spirit. Got it? I don’t always. Many times my mind is racing with ideas or replaying events over and over again. My body usually wants to be moving, remaining active with chores or exercise when possible. And my spirit…well, I don’t always check in to see how my spirit’s doing. My spirit is typically the one who wants to be still. It’s deeper and it’s hearing the voice of my Beloved calling from the deep, yearning to connect with Him.

I find myself most of the time staying “on the surface” of life, like the stereotypical news, sports and weather persona. I’m too busy to connect emotionally with God or anyone else. I have things to do, people to see, places to go, a long list in front of me to get accomplished. And where does this get me? Well, sometimes I get a lot done, but my spirit is undernourished. You see, Father God made us to be relational beings, and if I’m not being relational, then what’s the point of being?

We were meant to have emotional connections every day. Connecting with our own emotions, those of our spouse, our children, our friends and co-workers, and of course, the Lord. Some people naturally tend to link emotionally with others, sharing their dreams and desires as well as being a good listener to those who, in turn, disclose their   bundles of feelings. And emotional awareness is needed to unite with God too.

King David constantly was pouring his emotions out to the Lord. As you read through the Psalms, there are numerous examples of him sharing his fears, his anxieties, his joys, his sorrows. And God didn’t complain about it. I think we think that showing our emotions is a sign of weakness or a lesser, negative quality; but the Bible is full of people, including Jesus, who were keenly aware of their emotional state and brought it before the Lord. Their deep calling to His deep, spirit to spirit. They chose to stay connected to the One who could understand, console, and help them.

But to connect with God this way I have to know what’s going on in myself first. I have to still my mind and body enough to know how my spirit is doing. Brother Lawrence and Madam Guyon have shown us that it’s possible to continue working while communing with God, yet it’s more than just offering prayers and petitions to Him. It’s a relational linking, a joining of emotions, my heart to His, a deep to deep in the stillness of my spirit.

Everyone feels fearful or hurt from time to time; conflicts and misunderstandings are a part of life. There are basically two ways people respond: shame and condemnation, or guilt and accountability.

Challenges
Ron had a terrible day at work. His boss accused him of a mistake on a major project and he feels his job might be in jeopardy. He comes home wired, tense, longing for the refuge of his Lazy Boy/TV cave. His wife immediately hits him with, “the car won’t start” and “by the way, Jr. is failing math.” Then Ron loses it; he gets bitterly sarcastic with his wife and down right caustic with his son, “What’s the matter with you boy, are you an idiot? I told you to lay off those video games and study more.”

Shame and Condemnation
In a shame-based family system individuals respond to conflicts in shame perpetuating ways. There is a constant underlying message of devalue, not just communicating you did wrong but that you are wrong. These individuals have lived with the pain of shame instead of dignity and so spend their time protecting themselves from this pain by never allowing anything to be their fault. Since it is impossible to never be wrong, everything must be subject to judgment and charged accordingly. This ‘moral monitoring’ means that the littlest mistakes like, forgetting to floss, not rinsing off a dish, not taking your shoes off at the door, can get you “a look” that communicates, “What’s wrong with you?” The Pharisees lived here. Their hearts were never open to mercy and the smallest infractions were subject to their censure.

Shame is a hidden belief about self that “I am flawed.” This belief is triggered anytime something goes wrong. Therefore, life’s challenges can’t be seen on their own merits and viewed simply as a problem to be solved, but instead someone must always be to blame. I can’t allow it to be me, so it must be you. So Jr. doesn’t just need more study time or perhaps a tutor, Jr. needs to suffer for his insolence.

Personhood and Abuse
Personhood is the quality of being an individual person and so worthy of dignity. The origin of shame is abuse that violates and diminishes personhood. This is done through crossing mental, emotional, and physical boundaries by attacking another persons’ right to choose what they think or what action they’ll take. This plays out in statements like, “What’s the matter with you?” “What were you thinking?” or it could be a backhand across the face.

These attacks are in two categories: fight or flight. “Fight” is anything from a sarcastic remark, to a demeaning statement, to physical harm. “Flight” can be anything from the silent treatment, to not being willing to discuss certain issues, or even to full on abandonment.

Healthy Guilt and Accountability
All of us make mistakes sometimes. The provision for that is healthy guilt and accountability. If I have made a mistake, guilt is appropriate. Guilt is a painful feeling that I have violated one of my values. It is a remorseful awareness of having done something wrong. Healthy guilt leads me to take responsibility, walk in accountability, and make repair. If someone has acted inappropriately toward me, accountability has to do with honoring the other as a person yet not covering the consequences they face for their actions.

Unconditional love and healthy guilt allows people to make mistakes. When there’s a base of unconditional love and healthy guilt to resolve conflict rather than shaming behaviors to handle what bothers us, people can live in healthy community and growth takes place.

Growing in God’s love should move us toward treating others with dignity, even those we very much disagree with. The question of another person’s worth or dignity should never come into play. This has a huge affect on our walk with God. If I treat others with condemnation, I will not be able to escape feeling like God treats me that way. This is a milestone that must be crossed if we are to learn to walk in a depth of obedience to the Lord.

Many of us live very busy lives. We go from one thing to the next without taking a break. Sometimes it’s keeping up with our kids: going from work to soccer practice, grabbing drive-through food, cleaning up once we get home, then helping with homework till it’s bedtime and start all over again the next day. For others, it’s working through our lunch break, eating at our desks, running to do errands, and staying late because everything on our list is urgent and needs to be done yesterday. Unfortunately, this describes too many of us.

As I sit here writing this article (multi-tasking a few other things as I do), I am drawn to the space between this paragraph and the previous one. What is it? It’s that white space that my cursor makes when I hit the “return” key. Space…there’s nothing there. It’s empty. Wow. Wouldn’t I like to put some “spacing” in my life? Jesus did.

Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.” —Mark 6:31

We all need rest, and I’m not just talking about sleeping at night. As an old adage says, “We need to come apart before we come apart.” Studies have shown that this constant going and going leads to more stress and health problems. I’ve even heard conversations where there was a little competition as to who had the most stress on them, like it was a badge to wear, as if busyness was a sign of Godliness. It’s like we’re saying, “God, see how hard I’m working for Your Kingdom?” Performing. Striving. Warring….hit the return key.

That’s it. Double-space your life. If Jesus Himself needed to take time every now and then to quiet Himself and get some rest, then who do I think I am to not need this? Hit the return key again.

Just the other day this verse came to my mind: “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength,” Isaiah 30:15. Look at all those nouns – returning, rest, quietness, trust, strength – great words! Words I want in my life!

Okay, that does it. I choose to hit the return key throughout my day, to take some time to breathe deeply, feel the sunshine on my face, and calm my soul. I want to put all my tasks and “to do lists” on the side, just for a little while. I want to live a double-spaced life.

Equanimity is a fancy word for the Biblical rest spoken of in Hebrews 4. It means I am neither striving to make things happen nor avoiding what God would use to cause growth in our lives.

Striving – everyone faces fears and insecurities sometimes, usually daily.
When we feel insecure we often strive. We try and make things happen, try and jimmy a door open. We become controlling in some way, becoming more aggressive with others or giving them the silent treatment. We may make lots of vows to work harder or lose weight or avoid that bad habit at all costs.

Avoiding – we also have many ways we put walls around our hearts. A person cuts us off in traffic, our spouse is insensitive to our needs, our boss yells at us – “That jerk,” we think. The minute we label someone we are blocking him from our heart.

Acceptance – when we can walk in acceptance, acknowledging God in all our ways, giving Him thanks in all things, there’s a rest. From this place of rest grows the fruit of the Spirit. We honor all men, we honor ourselves, we get things done.

Contemplative prayer – the discipline of contemplative prayer fosters rest. I say some words of love to God and I wait in His presence. Sometimes I sense His presence, sometimes my mind wanders like crazy. Learning to accept whatever happens as exactly what God has for me at that moment, with no sense of frustration. This fosters equanimity, rest. This begins to spill over into other parts of our lives. When I’m not worked up to make things happen nor frustrated at things I don’t like, life flows.

As I was praying the other day, I was taking some time to be thankful. I was going through a list of things that God has done in my life, all the changes I’ve come through lately – those kinds of things. And then as I continued to pray, I realized that I started to put in a few “buts.” Ever done that?  You know, “Lord, thank You for _________, but….” Prayers like, “Thank You so much for the overtime, Lord, but…now I have to work all weekend and miss the big game.” There are those tinges of complaints within the gratefulness.

Another perfect opportunity when this happens to me is when I look at myself in the mirror. I pray, “Lord, thank You for my good health and the ability to run, and surf, and workout, but…I sure wish I could loose about five more pounds.”  Or “Lord, I know You love me, but…I’m not sure You really like me.” What’s up with all the “buts”?

Now the day I was praying and God brought this to my attention I heard Him say two words very clearly: “no buts.” That one little conjunction reveals a heart of dissatisfaction, He told me. I’m may be grateful to a point, but those three letters tend to find fault or put blame somewhere. It’s a word of exception or a circumstantial scenario.

Matt. 5:45 says He causes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust. It rains on good people and on bad. “Hello, welcome to life!” My level of acceptance of all things working for good is a bit low at times (Rom 8:28), and I know I need growth there.

So I’ve made a decision based on my prayer time: no more buts. I’m going to just state the first part of the sentence and leave it simple. I don’t want to “compound” the problem (a little English grammar joke there). “Lord, thank You for _________.” Period. No “buts.” Lord, forgive me for my murmuring and complaining and for adding that tiny word in my prayers. Thank You for Your grace and mercy as I grow in Your love. Period. End of prayer and article. No buts.

If you saw a penny on the ground, would you pick it up? I usually do, except the other day I couldn’t. I was riding my bike and saw one on the ground, but it was in the middle of a busy road I was crossing. I cringed a little and rode past it.

What’s the worth of a penny anyway, I thought. A lot of people don’t pick them up. There are millions of them and their value is only one cent. And then that little voice of the Spirit came to reveal something to me about this: “Many people feel like they are only worth a penny; like they’re not worth picking up either.” Another God-thought-provoking sentence from the Lord, indeed. Then He began showing me how some of us tend to see ourselves as lacking value and of no significance to the world, just like pennies on the ground.

I could feel His heart breaking for those “penny-thinking” people, and pictured Him walking the parking lots, streets, and gas stations with His head down searching for pennies on the ground. I saw Him actually looking for them, not haphazardly finding them randomly at times, but deliberately seeking them and picking them up. Father’s heart grieves for those who are downtrodden; who see themselves as “poor miserable worms” who don’t deserve a thing. Father’s heart yearns to gather them in His arms and comfort their fears and doubts, providing safety and security in His presence. Father’s heart delights to pour out blessings and “little kisses” of favor to His sons and daughters, purely for the joy it brings Him.

And Father’s heart sees the pennies on the ground and reaches down and picks each one up to put securely in His warm pocket of love. Their value is immeasurable. His value system is different from ours, so each of us cannot be compared to another. Each of us have our own path, our own journey that we’re going through. And sometimes we fall on the ground, out of strength, out of energy, out of everything. But Father’s love is towards all the pennies on the ground. Father’s love is always there to pick them up and keep them with Him. We are valuable to Him. I’ll try to remember that the next time I pick up a penny off the ground.